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Tags: Deal or No Deal / Hotel Deals / Concorde Hotels / Europe Hotels / → All Tags
How Special is the Special Winter Offer From Concorde Hotels?
Well, hello Paris. And Berlin. And Prague. And even Marbella. Christmas shopping on the Continent is looking pretty promising this year. The latest lot to offer special winter deals are the folk at Concorde Hotels. But is it worth it?
The Winter Offer which starts 1 November and ends March 31 promises bed, breakfast and a “surprise gift” if you stay two nights or more. And the rates sound pretty good – Prague from €80 ($118/£72), Berlin from €136 and Paris from €148.
Except we just looked up rezzie rates for a couple of properties, and looks like you can do better by simply paying up front, if all you want is a room with no added extras.
Tags: Hotel Deals / Hotel Packages / Europe Hotels / Luxury Hotels / Rocco Forte Hotels / → All Tags
Three For Two With The Rocco Forte Collection
Not going to Europe this summer? This might tempt you. Stay two nights at a Rocco Forte Collection hotel (with 12 to choose from in places you’d like to be anyway, like Rome, Prague, Berlin and St Petersburg), and they’ll throw in a third for free.
The only caveat – the offer is only valid for stays during high summer, between July 27 and September 4. Unfortunately, that’s also when most of the locals will have deserted places like Rome for the seaside – but hey, at least the buses will be a little less crowded.
With this offer, the Hotel de Rome in Berlin costs $861 per room for the three nights – not so bad for $287, given that it includes breakfast (although it excludes VAT). Brown’s Hotel in London, meanwhile, will set you back $950 for the full stay. So now all you have to do is choose which one.
Tags: Parma Hotels / Italy Hotels / Europe Hotels / Hotel Deals / → All Tags
More Italian Bang For Your Buck in Parma
The dismal state of the dollar required drastic budget cuts on a recent trip to Italy, so despite the adage “All roads lead to Rome” (been there, done it, love it), we took a detour, and instead, headed to Parma.
Parma may lack the glitz (and crowds) of the Italian capital, but it still oozes with all the charm that makes Italy one of the world’s most romantic destinations – cathedrals, art galleries, castles, culture, shopping, and killer wine and cuisine.
Since Parma is a fairly affordable destination, it opens up more opportunities for accommodations, than let’s say Rome, Florence or Venice.
Big decision: stay at a swanky five star for five nights or stretch the not-so-almighty buck for a solid one-week stay? The thought of an extended vaca won out, and online, rooms hovered right around a budget-friendly $100 per night rate at Hotel Maria Luigia (booked plenty in advance). The hotel touted four star status, and sì, it delivered.
Tags: Europe Hotels / UK Hotels / → All Tags
Top Ten Hotels in Britain List Gives Us New Ideas
So we got a bit freaked out when we read the headline at the UK Times about the top ten British hotels for 2009 -- we kinda thought 2008 only just started -- but now that we've calmed down, the list of ten independent hotels worth staying at, as picked by the Good Hotel Guide, is an interesting one.
Out of the ten hotels on the list, there are a few that sound especially interesting. The Star Castle Hotel on the Isles of Scilly (off the south-west corner of Britain) got us interested from the location alone--if you're lucky with the weather, this place sounds like the closest you can get to a tropical beach resort in Britain. Double rooms including two meals start from £144 (US$250) but it's also important to know that the Times reviewer complained about the dessert!
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WorldHotels Offering Guests the Chance to "Stay in Europe, Pay in Dollars"
Some great news for Americans looking to get a taste of Europe this summer without the bitter aftertaste of a Euro-to-Dollars conversion.
WorldHotels is offering a "Stay in Europe, Pay in Dollars" promotion--a one-to-one exchange--at all of their 41 hotels in Europe. Yay!
There is a slight catch however. The promotion is only good until August 31st and is only valid for Thursday-Monday stays. Still, it's a huge deal. The AP reports:
While rates vary, [a hotel publicist] said that an average rate is about 150 euros a night, which is the equivalent of about $237, depending on daily exchange rates. If you pay that 150 euro tab with 150 U.S. dollars, however, you save $87.
WorldHotels include the Hotel Plaza Brussels, the St. George Roma and the Hotel de Sers in Paris. So get booking!
Tags: Wheelchair Accessible Hotels / Disabled Access Hotels / Hotel Websites / Europe Hotels / Ibis Hotels / Scandic Hotels / ETAP Hotels / → All Tags
Wheelchair Accessible Hotels :: Scandic Hotels Do It Best
This week our roving correspondent Monica Guy is writing about an oft-overlooked aspect of hotels and travel: disabled access. Monica knows a lot about this subject as she works and travels frequently with Stephen Hawking. However, feel free to chime in with your thoughts and experiences too. Got a question? Let us know and we'll get it answered for you.
For disabled travellers outside of the US, perhaps a better option than designated specially-designed accessible hotels is to go for ordinary hotel chains who take access seriously.
Three cheers in this department go to the Swedish-owned Scandic Hotel chain. They recently won two prestigious awards for their efforts in the field of disabled access. Unlike most chains, they employ a full-time disability coordinator, Magnus Bergland, to advise on access issues and train staff in how to deal with guests with disabilities.
In fact, he not only advises, he makes all new staff get into a wheelchair and follow the 'guest's route' round the hotel, from parking and the reception desk to the room, bathroom and breakfast area. It's only by doing this, he claims, that people gain any sort of understanding as to the difficulties faced by disabled guests.
Tags: Wheelchair Accessible Hotels / Disabled Access Hotels / Hotel Websites / Europe Hotels / Turkey Hotels / → All Tags
Wheelchair Accessible Hotels :: Fully Accessible Hotels
This week our roving correspondent Monica Guy is writing about an oft-overlooked aspect of hotels and travel: disabled access. Monica knows a lot about this subject as she works and travels frequently with Stephen Hawking. However, feel free to chime in with your thoughts and experiences too. Got a question? Let us know and we'll get it answered for you.
A room at the Access Centre Hotel Marmaris in Turkey.So, you're disabled and planning a holiday. Given all the nightmare involved in finding a reliable, accessible hotel, aren't you tempted to go for specially designed and designated accessible hotel?
Accessible hotels are gradually popping up all over the hotel scene, but particularly near seaside resorts in the Mediterranean. They've been designed by architects to be suitable for guests with all sorts of different disabilities, from physical disabilities and wheelchair users to those with visual and hearing impairments.
Rooms often have hoists and lowering beds, wide doors, wheelchair-charging facilities, hand-bars everywhere, emergency cords, low-level switches, flashing or vibrating pillow alarms, accessible swimming pools, and all the rest, along with more disabled toilets than you can shake a walking stick at.
Tags: Wheelchair Accessible Hotels / Disabled Access Hotels / Hotel Websites / Europe Hotels / Paris Hotels / → All Tags
Wheelchair Accessible Hotels :: To Websites and Hotel Booking
This week our roving correspondent Monica Guy is writing about an oft-overlooked aspect of hotels and travel: disabled access. Monica knows a lot about this subject as she works and travels frequently with Stephen Hawking. However, feel free to chime in with your thoughts and experiences too. Got a question? Let us know and we'll get it answered for you.
When you book a hotel in, say, Paris, it's usually because you're not actually in Paris yet. That makes sense.
What makes no sense is that if you have an access need or disability, it's almost impossible to get reliable information or make a secure, discounted booking at a hotel. Unless you're actually there in person, which of course, you're not.
Want to find out what the problem is with hotel websites and booking services? Ready for a moan?
Tags: Wheelchair Accessible Hotels / Disabled Access Hotels / Europe Hotels / Paris Hotels / → All Tags
Wheelchair Accessible Hotels :: The U.S. Leads the Way
This week our roving correspondent Monica Guy is writing about an oft-overlooked aspect of hotels and travel: disabled access. Monica knows a lot about this subject as she works and travels frequently with Stephen Hawking. However, feel free to chime in with your thoughts and experiences too. Got a question? Let us know and we'll get it answered for you.
Stephen Hawking and his lovely assistants at the Ritz-Carlton Orlando, Grande Lakes.
The USA leads the world in terms of accessible hotels. That's the conclusion I've come to after several years spent travelling around with Stephen Hawking, the well-known disabled scientist (that's me on the left in the picture above.)
We've stayed in top and not-so-top hotels in cities all over the world, including in Hong Kong and China, Chile, Easter Island, the Virgin Islands, South Africa, Europe (Paris, Madrid, Barcelona, Geneva, Padua, Amsterdam, London, Oxford) and the US (Pasadena, Santa Barbara, College Station, San Francisco, Seattle, Washington DC).
One thing stands out from all our hotel experiences - in the US it is considered absolutely normal to be disabled, and the right of a disabled person to access the same hotel facilities as everyone else is uncontested. It might be hard for non-US residents to appreciate just how little that principle holds elsewhere in the world.
Tags: Wheelchair Accessible Hotels / Disabled Access / Europe Hotels / Paris Hotels / → All Tags
Do You Have Wheelchair Access?
This week our roving correspondent Monica Guy is writing about an oft-overlooked aspect of hotels and travel: disabled access. Monica knows a lot about this subject as she works and travels frequently with Stephen Hawking. However, feel free to chime in with your thoughts and experiences too. Got a question? Let us know and we'll get it answered for you.
The pool at the Access Centre in Turkey.
"Do you have wheelchair access?" It's a simple question, but one which causes anything between pained embarrassment and outright disdain when asked to hoteliers of many European hotels.
Accessibility of hotels is a subject we feel passionate about, although it's not the sexist subject in the hotel world. Partly because one of our bosses is both a wheelchair user and a nutcase traveller, staying in top hotels all over the world for much of the year.
Partly also because accessible tourism is becoming the next big thing; older and disabled travellers are quickly waking up to the fact that they can travel independently with friends and family, and no longer need to go in organised groups of oldies and other disabled people.
Tags: Hotel News / Europe Hotels / Cool Hotels / → All Tags
The Times Spills On Cool and New European Hotels
This weekend's UK Times published a list of what it thinks are the coolest new hotels across Europe.
We're not sure how much faith we can put on this list, since it does include the Adam and Eve in Antalya, Turkey, home to the world's slowest and most stupid bar staff. It does, however, get a bit of credibility back by adding the Chedi Milan, which probably does warrant the label of one of Europe's coolest new hotels.
So we're thinking that perhaps the new-since-last-month Mystique on the paradise of Santorini, Greece, might also be okay:
Its 18 villas are carved into the cliff face, each overlooking the caldera, and every one flat-screened and hi-fi'd. There's locally quarried limestone on the floor, original art on the walls, cushions clad in antique textiles.
Yep, definitely cool. They also give a tip on the Hotel Fouquet's Barriere in Paris which we've already decided is cool, after it opened in November last year. Perhaps it's all a matter of opinion on what's cool, but we guess a list is at least a starting point.
[Photo: newpn2000]
Related Stories:
· Europe's Coolest New Hotels [UK Times]
· A Parisian Hotel Deal [HotelChatter]
· No Paradise at Turkey's Adam and Eve Hotel [HotelChatter]
Tags: Ski Hotels / Europe Hotels / → All Tags
Ski In and Out at Ski Plaza Andorra
You might want to choose the famous alps of Switzerland or Austria for your European ski holiday; or you might decide to opt for lesser-known Andorra, that small mountainous country squeezed between France and Spain. (One good reason to not only holiday there but to move there is that its residents have the highest life expectancy in the world!).
But let's get back to your ski holiday: the Hotel Ski Plaza Andorra is said to be one of the most convenient places to step outside onto your skis or snowboard every morning, and it's comfortable enough to take good care of the aching muscles at the other end of the day. It sits next to a supermarket, pharmacy and ski hire shop, and 100 meters from the Canillo ski lift--close enough for even the worst beginner ski shufflers to get there.
But what might be more important is what's inside: for example, the junior suites which all come with a hydro-massage bath. You can also spend evenings relaxing in the Pic Blanc Sports Bar with "soft music, table games, pool, darts, cocktail, coffee and bar services". And you can say you've holidayed in Andorra. Who else can say that?
Related Stories:
· Hotel Ski Plaza Andorra reviews [TripAdvisor]
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