For the nights I was looking at, rates were $69 each for a standard king deluxe room, which came to $83 per night including taxes and surcharges.

Thanks to my IHG Rewards Club Select card (I still had the old one) and the Platinum status it conferred, I earned 7.5 IHG Rewards points per dollar on my stay plus 3x Ultimate Rewards points by putting the stay on my Chase Sapphire Reserve card. I did that instead of spending on my IHG card, which would have earned five more points per dollar, so that I had the flexibility of transferring Ultimate Rewards points to a number of different travel partners.

If I’d wanted to use points, this room would have cost 25,000 per night, but it would have been an abysmal value for the IHG poitnts, so I decided to pay cash — which also helped me hit some of my IHG Rewards Accelerate offer terms.