http://www.hotelchatter.com/ Hotel Reviews, Hotel Ratings, Hotel Openings en-us Copyright 2008 - SFO Media 2012-02-15T02:52:58Z HotelChatter HotelChatter http://www.hotelchatter.com/images/hcwhite.jpg http://www.hotelchatter.com/tag/Vacation%20Rentals http://www.hotelchatter.com/story/2011/7/22/10926/8464 <![CDATA[<p><img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/1425/santaynezrentals.jpg" class="top"><p> Over the weekend we headed to <b>Santa Ynez</b>, Calif. in Santa Barbara County where instead of booking a hotel room, we actually rented a house with two other couples (along with four children and one spoiled French bulldog.) Yet despite the idyllic location across from a small vineyard and the spaciousness of the house, we actually found ourselves missing a few of our beloved hotel creature comforts. <p>This surprised us since we were looking forward to pretending we were wealthy enough to own a giant piece of land and a picturesque home for the weekend. But while a house gave us the space we craved, not all the little amenities we are accustomed to at hotels are juliana 2011-07-25T16:11:19-05:00 http://www.hotelchatter.com/story/2011/2/7/94548/65094 <![CDATA[<p><object style="height: 305px; width: 500px"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/EwGEc7RltMA?version=3"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/EwGEc7RltMA?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always" width="500" height="305" class="top"></object></p> <p>Super Bowl ads: There were some last night. Leading the bunch, at least for us, was <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/homeawayvacation">the HomeAway shot across the bows of hotels everywhere</a> which asked, bluntly, "Why hotel when you can HomeAway?" Fighting words, those are!</p> <p>Featuring a rather loud and rather serious "minister of detourism" as a pitchman, HomeAway insists that "Families are getting swindled. Why? <b>Because hotels hate your guts!</b>" Thereupon, a baby is flung into a wall as if slapstick is the way to make an airtight argument in favor of this anti-hotel thesis. It is not.</p> <p>Logical fallacies aside, HomeAway's premise is that families get pbb 2011-02-07T10:30:40-05:00 http://www.hotelchatter.com/story/2008/4/7/125541/4750 <![CDATA[<p><img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/admin/orginal_condotel.jpg" class="imgborder"><p><i>The original condo-tel in SoBe?</i><p>When hotel hunting for our next vaca, we often forget to troll <a href="http://www.craigslist.org"><b>Craigslist</b></a>--for vacation rentals that is, not missed connections. Perhaps the reason we don't often think of it is because it's such a crapshoot. For instance, we have friends who scored an awesome place in Chelsea for a weekend in New York off the site, but our own attempts to find a vacation rental in Spain netted nothing but scams. <p> Similarly, The New York Times' <a href="http://travel.nytimes.com/2008/04/06/travel/06frugal.html?ref=travel">Budget Traveler Matt Gross</a>, tasked with finding cheap lodging in Miami for a weekend, took to Craigslist, netting similar mixed results. The listing, which touted "HoT SOBE condo for rent inside a NICE hotel!!" showed jennm 2008-04-07T13:11:11-05:00 25.778129 -80.133905 Search HotelChatter string http://www.hotelchatter.com/search/