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Free Hotel WiFi Even Goes as Far as Hotel Cars in Vietnam

Where: 19 Lam Son Square, District 1, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Hey hotels who haven't yet provided guests with free WiFi: this hotel in Vietnam has cars that are better than you. It's the Caravelle Hotel in Ho Chi Minh City and not only does it offer some really good (under $200) deals for stays including free breakfast buffets and airport rides, but it also boasts free WiFi throughout the property. And in case you need the bandwidth to be increased for some reason, they can take care of that as well.

Since the complimentary internet has been so successful over the last two years, the hotel has extended free WiFI to their fleet of six cars, with "interchangeable Wi-Fi routers creat[ing] hotspots using 3G and HSPDA technology that enables download speeds of up to 7.2MB per unit." Excellent.

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Vietnam Hotel Scene / Saigon Hotels / Hotel Amenities / Historic Hotels / → All Tags

Appliances Caught Between Centuries at Saigon's Continental Hotel

Where: 132-134 Dong Khoi St, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

All this week our roving correspondent Claire Duffett will be sending back her reports on the Vietnam Hotel Scene. Any questions or suggestions? Send 'em our way and we'll have Claire answer them for you.

We’ve been infatuated with Hotel Continental Saigon ever since we read Graham Greene’s The Quiet American way back when. Alas, we modern-day journalists can’t afford to stay in the place where Fowler and his fellow foreign correspondents partied back in the 1950s.

Despite our modest means, we still managed to catch a glimpse of the hotel when we passed through town a few weeks ago. And it met—and exceeded—our expectations.

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Historic Hotels / Vietnam Hotels / Ho Chi Minh Hotels / → All Tags

Sleep With History At Saigon's Hotel Continental

Where: 132-134 Dong Khoi St, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

France's meddling in Vietnam really didn't turn out well for anyone. But one of the positive side effects to the colonization is the Hotel Continental Saigon, in present-day Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. So it's no wonder Graham Greene made his protagonist a guest at the hotel when he wrote The Quiet American.

Gorgeous, imposing and extravagant French Colonial hotels are perhaps the only thing in HCM more ubiquitous than families of five speeding past on lawnmower-engine mopeds. Of these hotels, Continental is certainly the most historic and quite possibly the most beautiful.

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Anti-View / Ho Chi Minh City Hotels / → All Tags

Room With an Anti-View: A Balcony Wardrobe in Ho Chi Minh City

Where: Dong Khoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

You know the scene. You open the door to your brand new hotel room, run over to the window, open the blinds and bam, you are hit with the anti-view. Maybe you are looking down a dirty alley, witnessing a drug deal, staring at an air shaft in the face, or seeing a brick wall. Whatever you are viewing it is not extremely pleasurable. Help out your fellow hotel mavens by uploading your anti-views to the HotelChatter/Flickr photo pool, or by sending the photo along to us. Remember to tell us the name of the hotel and the room number with the not-so-easy-on-the-eyes view.

How's this for a contrast: if you stay at the Sheraton Saigon in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, you'll have a fantastic view of a swimming pool belonging to the Caravelle Hotel next door. But get one main street away from the action, and this is the view from your hotel window instead.

Vietnam vacationer ultrapop design had this to say about their choice:

Well, we did ask for a quiet room away from the main street. Behind it rises the modern Sheraton Hotel in stark contrast.

We're still not sure which hotel gives this view, but it's somewhere in the Dong Khoi section of Ho Chi Minh City, so drop us a line if you can identify it. And let us know if the same wardrobe selection is still hanging on that balcony.

[Photo: ultrapop design]

Hotel News / Vietnam Hotels / Accor Hotels / → All Tags

French Hotel Chain Invades Vietnam

French hotel operator Accor announced this week that they would be ramping up their presence in Vietnam, adding 12 hotels to their current 8 by the end of 2010.

Forget any visions of unspoiled hill tribe regions in the far north: the 150-room Pullman Sapa Resort and the 200-room Pullman Lao Cai Hotel are on the way. Heavily touristed Ha Long Bay will get its first international hotel: Novotel Ha Long Bay, opening this summer.

Two new Mercure brand hotels will open in Hanoi, scheduled for 2009 and 2010--the first Mercure hotels in the country. More Novotels are on the way, including one in the beach resort area of Nha Trang.

Surprisingly, there were no high-end Sofitel hotels in the announcement, despite a lack of choices for luxury travelers and a booming export economy attracting plenty of foreign business travelers. Vietnam attracted 4.2 million foreign visitors in 2007, an annual increase of over 17 percent.

Still these will probably not be the last of the announcements: Accor opened an office in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) on Wednesday.

Killer View / Ho Chi Minh City Hotel Reviews / → All Tags

Room with a Killer View: Sheraton Ho Chi Minh City

Where: 88 Dong Khoi Street, District 1, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

We are suckers for a room with a killer view.  We find that we are even more likely to forgive some minor hotel inconveniences if we can stare out the window at something pretty--yeah we are that shallow. Let's help out our fellow hotel mavens by uploading rooms with killer views to the HotelChatter/Flickr photo pool, or by sending the photo along to us. We will feature our favorites in this space from time to time. Remember to tell us the name of the hotel and the room number of the hot view.

This Killer View was taken from a room in the Sheraton Hotel in Ho Chi Minh City. Unfortunately, the photographer Brady realized that he had taken a picture of the wrong hotel pool.

I looked out the window from our lovely room in the Sheraton and gazed at a wonderful pool. I then realize it was the pool of the adjacent Caravelle. Crap! The Sheraton pool was ok but nothing great. Boring shape, not much sun, non-existent wait staff, no view.

This view of the Caravelle pool was so killer that Brady ended up booking a room there for the last night in town. Unfortch, he didn't get to try out the pool.

Related Stories:
· brady frequent traveler and eater's photostream [Flickr]

Good Rate / Vietnam Hotels / → All Tags

Good Rate :: Suite at the Park Hyatt Saigon

Where: 2 Lam Son Square, District 1, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

[Ed. Note: This is the Good Rate in our Good Rate/Bad Rate feature. This rate was valid on August 29, 2006 and is subject to change. Enjoy.]

If you're going to go all rock star on us and splash out in a suite, you should stay at the best place in town--right?

Our "Bad Rate" pick this week was $468 double for a suite at the Caravelle Hotel in Saigon, Vietnam (without breakfast). If you're going to spend that kind of money in a country where a $10 lunch is considered expensive and an air-conditioned backpacker hotel room is under $15, you should expect and get a lot.

So book a suite at the Park Hyatt Saigon, the reigning champ in this evolving city, and by most accounts the only true international-standard 5-star hotel in the area.

For a Park Suite King, the rate is $358 a night including breakfast. For that you get the usual upscale amenities, 70 square meters (750 square feet) of space, a marble bath, two 25-inch satellite TVs, and big windows with wooden shutters--a nice French Colonial touch.

The centrally-located Park Hyatt Saigon has a good fitness center, a nice outdoor courtyard pool, a spa, several highly-rated restaurants, and a staff that wins plenty of praise from guests. With many locally-rated 5-star hotels going for around $100 for a standard double, this is no screaming bargain, but if you're going to go first class all the way, do it right.

Related Stories:
· Park Hyatt Saigon reviews [TripAdvisor]
· Bad Rate:: Suite Miles Promotion at Carvelle Hotel [HotelChatter]

Bad Rate / Vietnam hotels / WorldHotels / → All Tags

Bad Rate :: Suite Miles Promotion at Caravelle Hotel

Where: 19 Lam Son Square, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

[Ed. Note: Welcome to our Good Rate/Bad Rate feature where we look at hotel prices in the same city and decide which is better worth your hard-earned benjamins. The screenshot here was taken on August 29, 2006 and rates are subject to change.]

We get all kinds of mileage promotions in our e-mail boxes and most of them don't make much sense. Take, for example, this "Suite Miles" deal being offered by several airlines and WorldHotels. Book a suite at one of the featured hotels and you will receive 5,000 airline miles per night. That sounds pretty enticing until you pull up the web site and look at the prices for various cities.

One of the most audacious examples is the Caravelle Hotel in Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh City, more commonly known as Saigon. As this screen shot shows, the rate for a suite there is a staggering $468, plus you still have to pay $16 each for breakfast and you'll get hit with 15% in taxes and fees on top. The nightly total comes to $538 before breakfast. This for a hotel where many of the rooms come with an unusual view--of other guests in the neighboring Sheraton.

Anyone who has been to Vietnam knows it would take a real sucker to pay over $500 for a night in a suite (unless it's a palatial Presidential Suite that takes up half a floor). Most of the time you can slip a $20 and a smile to the right person at a locally-owned hotel and get upgraded to a suite if one is open. Even if you want to book it in advance, you would only pay $173 at the Sheraton, $117 at the historic Grand Hotel (with gold plated bathroom fixtures!), and $236 at the Sofitel Plaza Saigon.

You would be far better off staying elsewhere and just buying some mileage with the money you saved. There's nothing sweet about this "Suite Miles" deal.

Related Stories:
· Caravelle Hotel Reviews [TripAdvisor]