Shortcut to domestic lounge access

☀️ Good morning and welcome back to Daily Drop — the gate agent in your life who secretly upgrades your mood every morning.

Here are your upgrades for today:

• 🍷 Detour destination: Texas edition

• 🦅 The weird trick that gets you into AA & Alaska lounges

• ✈️ Alaska & Hawaiian award chart shake-up

• 💳 Current Transfer Bonuses

🍷 Detour destination: Texas edition

There’s a new buzzword in travel for 2025: detour destinations.

The idea is simple — instead of paying through the nose in crowded hotspots, you slip just outside the main drag and discover towns with the same flavor for half the cost.

Take Austin, Texas. Everybody loves the live music, barbecue joints, and brewery scene. But with big-name festivals and social media hype driving tourism, hotels can run $300, $400, or even $500+ a night.

Just two hours west, though, you’ll find Fredericksburg — a small Hill Country town that feels like Austin’s cool cousin, just with more wine and fewer bachelorette parties. 😉

Here’s why it’s worth the detour:

• Wineries galore: Fredericksburg is the heart of Texas wine country, with dozens of wineries and tasting rooms. You can spend an afternoon hopping between vineyards, all without the Austin traffic.

• Enchanted Rock State Park: Hike to the top of this massive pink granite dome for panoramic Hill Country views — it’s one of the best outdoor escapes in the state.

• German roots: From schnitzel to Oktoberfest celebrations, the town’s Bavarian heritage shows up in the food, architecture, and festivals.

• Small-town charm: Main Street is lined with boutiques, beer gardens, and live music — the Austin vibe, but more laid-back.

And the best part? You’ll pay way less to stay here.

For example, this Marriott property in Fredericksburg goes for about $131 per night, while hotels in Austin often charge triple that.

Or you can get creative with points: thanks to the IHG 4th-night-free perk (from holding the IHG One Rewards Premier Credit Card), the local Holiday Inn Express in Fredericksburg runs just 17,000 points per night.

Since IHG is currently selling points with a 100% bonus, that means you could pay just $85 per night here by simply buying points.

Getting there is easy too. The smartest move is to fly into Austin (AUS), which has cheap award flights from just about everywhere.

For example, a nonstop Southwest flight from Chicago (MDW) will run you as few as 5,000 Southwest points. 👇

From there, it’s a scenic two-hour drive west, so your best bet is to rent a car at the airport. (Bonus: having wheels means you can winery-hop at your own pace — just make sure to draw straws for designated driver duty.)

So if Austin’s hotel prices give you sticker shock, remember there’s a detour waiting. Same barbecue, same music, way more wine — all for a lot less.

🦅 The weird trick that gets you into American Airlines & Alaska lounges

Okay, stick with me — this one sounds strange at first, but it’s actually a killer deal for frequent U.S. travelers.

By taking five minutes to set it up, you could score 12 months of unlimited lounge access with American Airlines and Alaska Airlines — even when flying economy on a domestic hop.

Here’s how it works:

Royal Jordanian (yep, the airline based in Amman, Jordan) is running a status match program that just became open for U.S.-based travelers.

Here’s how it works:

1. You must already have elite status with another airline (Delta, United, JetBlue, Southwest, Spirit, Frontier, etc.).

2. You apply to Royal Jordanian’s status match program, pay a one-time fee, and they “match” your existing status to their own frequent flyer program for 12 months.

3. The sweet spot is RJ Gold Sparrow status — it costs $149 to match into this tier.

Here is a quick chart of which U.S. airlines and status levels can get you Royal Jordanian Gold Sparrow status (really, stick with me):

So why would anyone pay for status with an airline they may never fly?

Because Royal Jordanian is part of the Oneworld alliance. That means its Gold Sparrow tier gives you Oneworld Sapphire, which unlocks perks across all Oneworld airlines… including American and Alaska. 😎

And here’s the magic part:

• Normally, even if you have elite status with American or Alaska, you can’t always use their lounges on domestic flights (unless you have other ways to access them).

• But if you have Oneworld Sapphire through a foreign partner airline (like RJ), you can access Admirals Clubs and Alaska Lounges when flying domestically.

So for $149, you’re effectively buying yourself a year of perks like:

• Domestic lounge access on American and Alaska (a huge loophole).

• Free checked bags and priority boarding on both airlines.

• The same elite benefits when you fly abroad on other Oneworld carriers (British Airways, Qatar, Cathay Pacific, Qantas, etc.).

Why it matters

If you fly American or Alaska even a few times a year, the math checks out fast: one trip with lounge access + waived bag fees could cover the $149 fee.

Add in priority check-in, security, and boarding, and the travel experience gets a big upgrade.

Personally, I love my oneworld status for flying airlines like Cathay Pacific and Qatar, where my status gets me into some crazy world-class lounges. 👇

Bottom line

It’s a weird workaround, but it works: pay $149 to match your existing airline status to Royal Jordanian, and suddenly you’re sipping free drinks in a lounge at Dallas–Fort Worth before your domestic flight.

✈️ Alaska & Hawaiian award chart shake-up

Atmos Rewards quietly updated its award chart overnight for flights operated by Alaska and Hawaiian Airlines within North America.

Don’t panic — it’s not all bad.

The big change: pricing is now purely distance-based. Before, Hawaii, Canada, and Mexico had their own separate charts. Now it’s all rolled into one, with a new top-tier distance band for the longest flights.

That means nonstop East Coast–Hawaii routes just got pricier.

But not everything went up. Some shorter flights actually got cheaper. For example, Southern California to Los Cabos, Mexico, now falls into a lower distance band — I even found plenty of dates under 10,000 Atmos points one-way.

That said, keep expectations in check: Alaska and Hawaiian awards are still dynamically priced, so the chart is more of a suggestion than a promise.

The real sweet spot with Atmos Rewards remains partner awards — like booking American Airlines flights — where the chart is far more predictable.

That’s it for this week, folks! I hope you enjoyed this travel inspo and sweet workaround for getting domestic lounge access.

Have a great weekend, and we’ll see you bright and early Monday.

Peace out ✌️

42.3555° N, 71.0565° W

With contributions by Tiffany Eastham, McKay Moffitt, and Benji Stawski