I've started comping 18 months ago, and I have to say, I count myself very lucky to have won a few very nice things. Thanks to my hobby, we'd been on a mini break to Paris to one of the most luxurious hotels in the city last year (we'd never been able to afford that; it was an interesting double OTT experience), this year we spent a night in London and Brighton, and a weekend in Cambridge and Jersey. also, I love winning beauty products (my relatives rally appreciate it as I pass a lot onto them), restaurant vouchers and fashion items.
The last several months have been quite dry for me, and started to loose the inspiration, until I received a lovely e-mail from Galbani Cheese. They ran a competition for a 3-night city break to Florence, with flights, accommodation, insurance, a one-day cooking course and some spending money. I was over the moon with hubby, as we always wanted to visit Florence - it was a dream prize. We were also glad that travel was included (in all my previous wins, travel was never included and booking flights/trains were quite expensive), the cooking course was also a big bonus (learning traditional Italian foods from locals, ohhh yessss!!!).
After a few days it turned out that the hotel is actually 80 miles from Florence, in a quiet area of the region so we asked them if we could put the spending money towards a couple of nights stay in Florence itself as we really wanted to see the city and the famous museums. We picked the date, designed to celebrate hubby's birthday in Florence, which is going to be a lovely treat for him, so happy that I can present him with such a dream trip!
At this stage it seems we're going to spend 5 nights in Florence afterall, as the other hotel was fully booked, which is in our favour. Really looking forward to this cultural holiday...and cooking with Mario! :)