I recently had a reader ask me about the best miles to collect to get from Salt Lake City to Cozumel, Mexico. The answer illustrates the best ways to get to the Caribbean and Mexico, so I thought I'd share and expand upon it here.

Near international destinations like Cozumel can be an excellent deal on region-based award charts like those used by American, United, US Airways, and Delta.

Edit: Airfare deals come and go quickly. This is dead. But type in your email address on the top left of the page for one, free daily email to your inbox with tips and tricks to travel cheap or free!

The offers for the cards listed in this post have also expired, so the links have been removed.

Next week I am going to Paraguay for eight days. A trip out of Argentina is necessary to renew my 90 day tourist visa, and I wanted to check the sixth South American country off my list, instead of repeating Uruguay, the easy choice. (Only four more CONMEBOL countries to go!)

I've never been to Paraguay. I'm sure tons of you have (even though until American Airlines launched a Miami-Asuncion route in November, there were no direct flights between the US and Paraguay.)

I will arrive in Asuncion and leave from Ciudad del Este. I speak Spanish.

Raise your hand if you like calling credit card companies.

If you're going to the Frequent Traveler University this weekend, let's meet up! At the last FTU meetup in Los Angeles, we were able to meet a ton of new people and put some faces to familiar names.

The second you move abroad, you become a lot more popular! That far flung country looks a lot better to family and friends as soon as they know they'll have a free bed and tour guide. My sister wanted to come visit me in Argentina in mid-May, so we set out to find her the best award ticket possible. Only one minor problem. As of two months ago, she had zero miles.

We ended up booking her a roundtrip from Los Angeles to Buenos Aires for a weeklong trip for 60,000 United miles.

EVA Air--Taiwan's second largest carrier--has announced that it will join the Star Alliance June 18, 2013.

EVA Air--Taiwan's second largest carrier--has announced that it will join the Star Alliance June 18, 2013.

Reader Christopher emailed me an exciting tip the other day: free oneways are possible on United awards within the continental USA and Canada. I already knew free oneways were possible on international United awards and awards to Hawaii, but this was news.

He sent me some screenshots, and I was able to replicate his findings and add some more of my own. I learned four things:

Christopher's tip: You can get a free oneway on roundtrip Standard economy awards within the US and Canada. That means three oneway Standard awards for 50k United miles.

United, US Airways, American, and Delta among others rely on award charts to determine the price of your award.