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Hotel Opening Rates / Hotel Renovations / Sydney Hotels / Park Hyatt Hotels / Australia Hotels / → All Tags

Park Hyatt Sydney Will Reopen March 1 at $855 a Night

Where: 7 Hickson Road, The Rocks, Sydney, NSW, Australia, 2000

We knew the big, big revamp of the Park Hyatt Sydney was going to be a big deal. But deal is not a word you're going to hear in any other capacity when it comes to this harbour-front icon.

Apparently the hotel is on track to re-open in mid-February but is taking reservations from March 1 onwards. And the starting rate for a night on March 1st? $AUD 855 a night.

Before you think, but hey, that's Aussie dollars. It's got to be cheaper when you convert it, right? --check out how strong that Aussie dollar is. The rate converts to $893 US dollars. Ouch.

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Sydney Hotels / Hotel News / Park Hyatt Hotels / Hotel Renovations / Hotel Reopenings / Australia Hotels / → All Tags

The Park Hyatt Sydney Will Be More Luxe Than Ever When It Reopens Later This Year

Where: 7 Hickson Road, The Rocks, Sydney, Australia, NSW 2000

Floor-to-ceiling windows GALORE at the newly-reopened Park Hyatt Sydney

Luxe travelers to the Land Down Under were dealt a blow when the iconic Park Hyatt Sydney closed its doors almost a year ago for an Extreme Hotel Makeover. After being stripped and redesigned nearly from scratch, the hotel is set to open later this year and promises to be more extravagant than ever. With all of the major nips and tucks it's received, you'd swear it doesn't look a day over its 21-years.

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Hotel Club Lounges / Intercontinental Hotels / Sydney Hotels / → All Tags

Inside the Club Intercontinental Sydney

Where: 117 Macquarie St., Sydney, NSW, Australia, 2000

Over on Jaunted, you can get our inside looks at some of the world’s best airline lounges, so we thought we’d do something similar here and start talking about some of the hotel lounges we’ve frequented lately for our new series on Hotel Club Lounges. Today, HotelChatter contributor Eric Rosen takes us along with him to the Sydney Club InterContinental.

During our last stay Down Under, we spent a few days at the Intercontinental Sydney, and spent a fair amount of our time hanging around the hotel’s Club Intercontinental lounge, which has to be one of our favorites in Australia.

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Hotel Openings / Hotel News / Sydney Hotels / Hotel Opening Rates / → All Tags

Sydney Gets a New Hotel with Park8

Where: 185 Castlereagh Street, Sydney, NSW, Australia, 2000

The folks behind Australia’s privately owned mini-chain, 8Hotels (the Diamant, the Kirketon), recently opened up a new boutique hotel called Park8 in the center of Sydney a block from Sydney’s sprawling Hyde Park, in what used to be the Central Park Hotel.

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Hotel Bars / Sydney Hotels / Hilton Hotels / → All Tags

Hilton Sydney Transforms Into Covent Garden on Fridays

Where: 488 George Street, Sydney, NSW, Australia, 2000

We might be in for record-breaking temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere this summer, but if your travels are taking you to Australia in the next few months, there’s already a brisk chill in the air foretelling of crisp winter days and nights to come. To mark the changing of seasons the Hilton Sydney is throwing a Winter Party that will transform the outdoor terrace at Zeta Bar into Covent Garden starting at 6:00pm every Friday evening.

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Hotel Construction / Hotel News / Sydney Hotels / Australia Hotels / → All Tags

Sydneysiders Afraid New Harbour Hotel Will Turn City Into a Mini-Dubai

Where: Sydney, NSW, Australia, 2000

The best hotels in Sydney are undoubtedly the ones with harbour views—the Shangri-La, the Park Hyatt, the InterContinental, the Observatory. It's been years since a new hotel had the chance to muscle in on this priceless real estate but now there's one in development, it's causing a ruckus. The biggest complaint? That the proposed 698-foot-high hotel perched on a pier jutting into the water will turn Sydney's skyline into a mini Dubai.

The yet-to-be-named hotel is part of the larger Barangaroo project at Darling Harbour—a mixed-use retail, public domain and housing plan for the last remaining piece of harbour foreshore available for development. Many of the project's plans are still under public review, and unfortunately the Aussie public is giving a big thumbs down to the plans for the hotel.

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Room Service / Australia Hotels / Hotel Restaurants / Shangri-La Hotels / → All Tags

Room Service Breakfast at the Shangri-La Sydney is Pricey In Any Language

Where: 176 Cumberland St [map], Sydney, NSW, United States, 2000

While shacked up at the Shangri-La Sydney recently, we could barely tear ourselves away from the gorgeous views. But then we decided to flick through the room service menu and off came our rose-colored glasses... We all know that hotel food is expensive, and room service items even more so. But seriously who pays $44—plus delivery charges—for bacon and eggs?

Now, we love love love an Aussie breakfast—the bacon there is out of this world and we may have eaten a whole pig's worth of the stuff in two weeks. But we could most definitely not drop a bright yellow Aussie fifty dollar note on a few strips, even if it did come with fruit, toast, hash browns, sausages, tomatoes, mushrooms, eggs, juice and Darjeeling.

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Sydney Hotels / Killer View / Hotel Service / Australia Hotels / Shangri-La Hotels / → All Tags

It's Hard To Beat The Views At Shangri-La Sydney

Where: 176 Cumberland St, Sydney, NSW, Australia, 2000

Yeah, mate, yesterday's Guess The Hotel shot was taken from level 14 of the Shangri-La Sydney, where we can barely tear ourselves away from the window.

Back when this was the ANA Hotel, the bar on level 36, now known as Blu Bar was the place to wow tourists. The newly renovated bar still provides knockout views, but there's nothing quite like knocking the socks off longtime Sydneysiders by inviting them into your hotel room to see this more personal view of their city.

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Guess The Hotel / → All Tags

Guess The Hotel With The Double-Banger View Of Sydney Harbour Icons

Welcome to a special Down Under edition of Guess the Hotel!

This is one of those instances where we're going to have to give you the location of the hotel because, frankly, if you can't guess that from the photo, you really should head back to your third-grade geography class.

Yes, we're here on a whirlwind visit to our one-time hometown of Sydney, and will bring you some more observations from this spot on the harbour tomorrow. (Notice we're even using the Aussie spelling of 'harbour'? When in Sydney, and all that ...)

But in the meantime, here's how our little game works: we give you some hints, you put your guesses in the comments below, and we'll reveal the name of the hotel tomorrow.

Got it? Good. Here we go...

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Celebrity Scoop / Park Hyatt Hotels / Kristen Stewart / Hotel News / → All Tags

Kristen Stewart Gives Oz a Warm Welcome at the Park Hyatt Sydney

Where: 7 Hickson Road, The Rocks, Sydney, NSW, Australia

The balconies at the The Park Hyatt Sydney have seen their share of canoodling couples (including HotelChatter) but when Twilight star Kristen Stewart rolled into town, this is how she made use of her room view--by smoking a cigarette and flipping off the paparazzi. What a lovely young lady!

Here's a hint KStew: If you want some privacy on your trip to Sydney, don't smoke a cigarette on the balcony. Or perhaps avoid the celebrity trap that is the Park Hyatt and stay at the Four Seasons or The Observatory instead.

Hotel WiFi / Sydney Hotels / Hotel Amenities / → All Tags

Wherefore Art Thou, Free Hotel WiFi in Sydney?

Australia loves its tech. Aussies were drunk texting long before Americans, and now they're just as attached to their Blackberries and iPhones. But when it comes to Hotel WiFi? That's a whole other tragic tale ...

We thought what we wanted was simple: A nice hotel in the Sydney CBD for one night this summer. A place we could rest comfortably in between jaunts and get some work done—with free WiFi. We had heard horror stories of guests being presented with $300 hotel internet bills at the end of a stay but shrugged them off as urban legend. Sure, broadband internet access in general is a bit wonky in Australia—it's not as widespread, or as fast, or as affordable as it is in the States. But surely hotels were at the top of their game, no?

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Celebrity Scoop / Lady Gaga / Sydney Hotels / Sheraton Hotels / → All Tags

Lady Gaga Stayed in a Sheraton During Her Visit to Sydney

Where: 161 Elizabeth Street, Sydney, NSW, Australia, 2000

A huge story broke on Saturday, when a Lady Gaga fan revealed that he was not only able to get hired as local, temporary crew for Gaga's concert in Wollongong, Australia, but that he scored a few pictures of her dressing room and even stole her itinerary for her Australia visit late last week.

Of course the Gaga devotees are geeking out over her schedule, which includes times for prayer before shows, a visit to the Nan Tien Buddhist Temple and also hours for "lite glam" and "glam," but we're most shocked at her choice of hotel in Sydney: Sheraton on the Park.

What's so special about this Sheraton? Find out, after the jump

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