Santiago Travel Guide
Tags: Party Dispatch Report / W Hotels / Hotel Openings / Hotel Parties / Santiago Hotels / → All Tags
Inside The W Santiago's Grand Opening Party
For the opening of the W Santiago Chile we were fortunate to have Jonathan Franklin and photographer Morten Andersen, the guys behind Addict Village attend the party and report back to us on what they saw. We know, we know, what a tough assignment. Enjoy.
W chose Santiago as its first ever South American location roughly five years ago. Finally on Tuesday, The W Hotel Santiago held its official opening party, a trademark WOW experience that included a rooftop pool adorned with three female synchronized swimmers in body gripping silver suits, live bands on various stages and the constant buzz from the estimated 1,200 guests.
Beginning at 8pm, paparazzi stalked the entrance as a virtual "Who’s Who" of Southern Cone businessmen, artists, models (lots), and a few Trustafarians gathered for a summit of a globalized tribe, a roving band of creatives. It felt like an art festival as painters, jewelry designers and Google nerds mixed with surfers and journalists.
W Hotels often brag about their "cool" but we have to admit, even the public spaces off the parking garage where the hotel's opening party was held, are cool. Three floors underground in "Great Room 2", hundreds of hotel guests listened to a rocking Argentine band. As the guests wandered amidst candlelit tables, they were tempted by Roman Empire-sized offering of cheese and wine. The wheels of cheese were the size of basketballs.
Fountains of chocolates and trays of oysters competed for attention. A migrating flock of waiters and hostesses swooped in to remove empty glasses, fill empty plates as they deliver a W trademark: friendly, worldy staff.
Where else does the elevator guy answer the question ‘where you from?’ with, “Born in Chile, raised in Belgium but lived in Singapore for a long time.”
Tags: W Hotels / South American Hotels / Chile Hotels / → All Tags
Santiago Gets a Touch of W Cool
Give us two weeks off and 50,000 frequent flyer miles and we'd high-tail it south of the equator to Chile – especially since the dreary winter season is about to cast its Vitamin D deficient pall upon us until April, at least. Note to self: when it’s winter in the northern hemisphere, it’s always summer somewhere else.
In our Chilean travels, we’ve had our way from Calama to Cape Horn, but have yet to spend more than an overnight and a few in and out flights from Aeropuerto de Santiago in Chile’s fine capital city.
For such excursions, we really dig the Holiday Inn Santiago directly across the street from the airport ticketing gate, but are excited to expand our city wide explorations now that W Hotels has opened its first-ever South American hotel, The W Santiago.
Tags: HotelChatter Reviews / Holiday Inns / Airport Hotels / Santiago Hotels / South America Hotels / → All Tags
Holiday Inn Santiago Airport Makes You Wish You'd Missed Your Flight
The Holiday Inn brand doesn't necessarily evoke a sense of hipness or luxury, but the Holiday Inn Santiago Airport just may change everything you think about this well-known chain.
Located literally less than 50 steps from the front entrance to Aeropuerto de Santiago, this property has every amenity the business or casual traveler needs for a long layover or comfortable overnight stay. If you miss your flight or get delayed, there may just be no better place to stay in Santiago.
Tags: 33rd-Parallel-South-Hotels-Map / 33rd Parallel South Hotels / Santiago Hotels / → All Tags
Where to Stay in Santiago
All this week, Eric Rosen will be bringing us his hotel recommendations for an interesting trip down in South America. He explains it all in our latest hotel guide--Budget Boutique Hotels of the 33rd Parallel South.
Santiago is not one of the most tourist-friendly destinations in South America. Perhaps that’s the last remnant of a past strewn with the wreckage of successive dictatorial regimes. Or maybe it’s just because the city itself isn’t that pretty despite the beautiful snow-capped Andes that saturate every vista. Most people don’t even exit the airport, but simply use the city as a transfer hub to Chile’s other points of interest. This is a city of over 6 million people, though, so there is still a lot of fun to be had, good food to eat, fine wine to drink, and sights to see.
Tags: Business Travel Hotels / Anti-View / Chile Hotels / Monica Guy / → All Tags
Chilean Hotel Scene: How Do You Say Anti-View in Spanish?
This week our roaming correspondent, Monica Guy, is giving us the low-down on the Chilean Hotel Scene. Here she encounters una vista mal. Enjoy.
Lucky Lorie and Paul Bennett, who found a killer view staring at them out of the window of the businessy Park Plaza Hotel in Santiago, Chile.
We on the other hand spent the night in the Radisson Plaza Santiago Hotel, a similar 160-room 5-star mega-hotel in Santiago's business district.
In their information about the local area, they forgot to mention they're backed right onto a mega-building site which actually seems to create 100 times more dust and noise and pollution than buildings.
If you're lucky, you'll be on the other side of the building, which faces a blank tower block.
How miserable. You're in one of the hottest capitals in one of the most beautiful countries in the world, you have to work (presumably you're here on business, or you wouldn't be staying at the Radisson) and to top it all off, the view out of your hotel window is enough to make you want to top yourself off.
The hotel is fine - standard business-hotel affair, with a piano player tinkling away in the small bar, a small swimming pool and a well-equipped gym on the top floor (at least you can see over the top of the building site) and all the usual knobs and whistles of a Radisson.
Service is sloooooow, and we couldn't get WiFi to work, but apart from that you'll get pretty much what you expect.
Rates are standard business hotel rates, with a bit taken off for Latin America. If you can't pass the bill on to your boss without looking at it, don't bother staying here.
Tags: Killer View / Chile hotels / → All Tags
Room with a Killer View: Park Plaza Hotel in Santiago
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.
Visit the web site for the Park Plaza Hotel in Santiago, Chile, and you get the impression that this is a sedate 104-room city business hotel, featuring the standard amenities and typical international furnishings. But look out the window of your room and...wow!
This photo comes to us from travel writers and photographers Lorie and Paul Bennett. They say the hotel has a certain look of "dowdy elegance" and rooms are on the small size, but you can't beat the snow-dusted mountain views from the Andes-facing rooms and the 15th-floor solarium pool.
Related Stories:
· Park Plaza Santiago reviews [TripAdvisor]
Tags: Hotel Hype / → All Tags
Chile Gets W'd
Maybe W should change the whole whatever, whenever thing to include wherever. Seriously, W's are beginning to pop up all over the globe. Is that a good thing? Well, either way, in 2008,W Hotels will open their first South American property in Chile.
Aside from the over-hyped Whatever/Whenever service (they always neglect to tell you that they will charge you for this service), the W Hotel Santiago will also have an open terrace restaurant, nightclub, and signature Bliss spa.
Sounds like the 205-room hotel will give some guests reasons to hide in their room during their visit to the Chilean capital. But considering the ideal location on Avenida Isidoro Goyenechea, Santiago's inspiring backdrop, and the nearby ski slopes and beaches, guests should be motivated to actually leave the heavenly confines the W will provide, at least for an hour or two.
This continues W's worldwide expansion that will eventually include: Barcelona, Hong Kong, Shanghai, and of course, our favorite hotel whore, Dubai.
Related Stories:
· W Hotels Makes the Next Stop on Its Global Expedition: Santiago, Chile [HospitalityNet]
· Dubai Seeks Hotel Domination [HotelChatter]
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Amazing Race 7 Hotel Report: Danger Pedro de Valdivia
In our opinion Amazing Race jumped the shark this season. It would be easy to point to Rob & Amber as the sole reason for the shows downfall, however, we think it has as much to do with the rest of the cast as with Rob & Amber. This season just isn't clicking.
Our opinion aside, we have a job to do--report on Amazing Race hotels, so plod on we will.
This week's race ended at Cerro Santa Lucia in Santiago Chile. That place looked beautiful, did it not? Spanish fountains, castle like architecture, what's not to like? Well, you might be surprised to learn that many recent Cerro Santa Lucia visitors over on Virtual Tourist reiterate this advice: Don't go to Cerro Santa Lucia after dark.
Apparently, Santiago's landmark hill has some crime issues. Bummer. Our solution would be to camp out in the best part of Providencia, away from the Cerro Santa Lucia, at the Hotel Orly.
Recent visitors to the Orly rave about its cleanliness and friendliness, two things that we hope rubs off on the Amazing Race cast if they stay here.
One recent guest said:
I am, to say the least, a high maintenance guest who NEEDS things a certain way. Hotel Orly has the panache of any world class bo[u]tique hotel to accomodate guests like me.
See, Hotel Orly is probably the only hotel in all of Chile that could put up with this Amazing Race cast for a night.
Related Stories:
· Amazing Race 7 Hotel Report: When In Incaville... [HotelChatter]
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