Omni Hotels Select Guest Benefits

I'm a big fan of Omni Hotels, which is a chain of luxury hotels throughout the US. I've been lucky to stay at three of their hotels for business:

• Omni Dallas Hotel (downtown Dallas)
• Omni William Penn in Pittsburgh
• Omni Bershire Place in NYC

The Omni Dallas Hotel is my favorite hotel in the US. You can read my gushing review on TripAdvisor here.

The Omni Select Guest loyalty program is pretty nice for members without status. It offers:

• Complimentary wifi
• Complimentary beverage service in the morning
• Complimentary pressings for 2 items
• Complimentary water the night of arrival

All you have to do is sign up. After 10 nights, you attain Platinum Level Status and after 30 nights, you attain Black Level status. I somehow managed to achieve Platinum status last year and in addition to upgrades and late checkouts, one of the benefits is 'GHA Discovery Local Experience'. I had no idea this benefit meant anything much until I received an email saying I had an award available and went to the GHA website to do some research. What is GHA? GHA is a global hotel alliance program that Omni participates in. Once you receive status in the Omni program, you also receive status in the GHA program. That means you will get some of your status benefits in luxury hotels around the world. That does not mean you can redeem free nights outside of Omni.

The GHA Discovery Local Experience award is a perk you can add to your stay at one of the hotels participating in GHA. It's like reserving a shopping package or dining package at a hotel except in this case you are getting a free 'package' on top of a regular stay. I reviewed the experiences available to Platinum members and some of them are really cool. And there a few that do not require a stay at the sponsoring hotel so in that case it literally is a free perk! You still have to spend money to get to the event location but details...

The two experiences that I liked the most for Platinum members are:

Cruise and lunch around the Thimble Islands in Connecticut for 4:

Munich Airport Tour for 2:

I'll probably use my award on the Thimble Islands and take my mom, grandma, and uncle but that Munich Airport Tour is so tempting. If you can redeem it or have redeemed it please let me know of your experience!

What are your experiences with Omni Hotels? Which one is your favorite? Have you ever redeemed a local experience award?