We have proof that HFP readers are keen to get travelling again!

Last week was the 12th week that we have been running Head for Points from our various homes.

I’d managed the first 80-odd days without any problems, but last Monday I finally hit a bit of a wall.  On Wednesday I went back into our office – which is an 8-mile round-trip walk – for the day, just to get out of the house.

An 8-mile walk and a day ‘out’ put me in a better mood on Thursday.   And then, out of nowhere, an email popped up from Park Plaza Hotels, offering £99 stays at the five-star Park Plaza Westminster Bridge in London, and €89 stays (€97 with city tax) at the Park Plaza Victoria in Amsterdam.

I thought this was an impressive deal, although it was obviously restricted.  You had to stay by 30th September, and of course at present the Dutch Government isn’t even allowing UK residents to enter the country.  Luckily this was a fully refundable deal.

I popped it onto Head for Points during Thursday, although I didn’t expect much from it.  I probably wouldn’t have bothered at all if I hadn’t already discussed Park Plaza Westminster Bridge in an article earlier that day on the 100% bonus for buying Radisson Rewards points, which is still running if you’re interested.

Within an hour, however, readers were booking.  And they didn’t stop.

On Friday morning the article was emailed out – and booking went crazy.

(The offer still seems to be live even though Radisson has pulled the landing page.  Go to the hotel pages directly – London here, Amsterdam here.  Under ‘Special Rates’ select ‘Promotion Code’ and put in the code FLASH for a stay between 4th July and 30th September.)

By Sunday night, over £41,000-worth of rooms had been booked via the link in our article.  Many more readers will have booked direct, so the total will easily exceed £50,000.

This is, by any stretch, an amazing response.  Obviously, given that these rooms are refundable, quite a few will be cancelled in the end.  However, you couldn’t ask for a bigger vote of confidence in travel from the HFP readership than booking £50,000-worth of rooms across just two hotels in 48 hours.

The success of this deal has cheered me up considerably.  It is clear that the desire to travel is still as strong as ever amongst our readers, as is their willingness to jump on a good deal.

It’s ironic that this article is being published on the same day that the UK Government is introducing quarantine, effectively killing off both incoming and outgoing tourism.

Few people seriously believe that this will last beyond the end of June, however.  We look forward to sharing the best of the travel bargains with you as Europe, if not the rest of the world, starts to open up this Summer.