Tag: Honeymooners Down Under
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A Hayman Island Alternative: The Thala Beach Lodge
While checking out our recent coverage of hotels Down Under, a tipster passed along this suggestion, The Thala Beach Lodge located on a private beach between Cairns and Port Douglas.
The lodge won the 2006 TripAdvisor's Traveler's Choice for Best Luxury in the South Pacific and it's not hard to understand why. From our tipster:
Each room is a private bungalow on stilts, with meandering paths to the main building housing a restaurant and a lounge. There no doors, no windows (on the main house) Great pool area.
The reviews on TripAdvisor are also stellar with several saying the pool are is one of the best they have ever seen. And there's actually two pools here. The main pool has waterfalls, spas and grottos which overlook the ocean. A smaller more intimate pool is located among the hotel's gardens for a quieter experience.
Everything about Thala looks good to us--the private beach experience, the friendly staff, the anti-mega-resort feel, the proximity to the Great Barrier Reef and the nature that envelopes it--yet some of the decor throws us off. We are seeing some seat cushions on their website that have fluorescent colors from 1988. It reminds us too much of our Jams heyday.
[Photo: Jonahleon]
Related Stories:
· Thala Beach Lodge reviews [TripAdvisor]
Honeymoon Hotels / Honeymooners Down Under / Sydney Hotel Reviews / Holiday Inns / → All Tags
The Honeymooners Down Under: Final Stop, Old Sydney Holiday Inn
HotelChatter's Senior Editor Juliana borrowed a page from vintage Britney Spears' 2004 playbook and got hitched after a brief engagement. Juliana and spouse went a little further than Brit and K-Fed's honeymoon in Fiji by spending their first few weeks of newlywed bliss in Sydney, Australia with a sidetrip to the Whitsunday Islands. For the rest of the week, she'll be telling you where she stayed and whether or not it was honeymoon appropriate. So, if you have any questions about honeymoon or Australia travel, send 'em our way.
We started the trip off with a bang, staying at the hip Park Hyatt Sydney and then moving over to posh The Observatory Hotel.
Things were dicey when we hit up the Hayman Island Resort and upon our return to Sydney for one final night before going home, we were all out of honeymoon spending money. Fortunately, we were able to get a room at the Old Sydney Holiday Inn, right in the Rocks near Circular Quay. (Truth be told, we wanted to go back to the Park Hyatt down the street but those rooms were going for $700 AUD a night.)
The full, but brief, Holiday Inn review after the jump.
Killer View / Honeymooners Down Under / Sydney Hotel Reviews / Hyatt Hotels / → All Tags
Room with a Killer View: Park Hyatt Sydney, Again
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 the littlekitchen restaurant inside the Park Hyatt Sydney which has some of the best views in town. Just make sure you book a Harbour View room otherwise the city view looks out onto a giant wall.
Related Stories:
· The Honeymooners Down Under: The Park Hyatt Sydney [HotelChatter]
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The Honeymooners Down Under: Beach Front Villa Video Tour
HotelChatter's Senior Editor Juliana borrowed a page from vintage Britney Spears' 2004 playbook and got hitched after a brief engagement. However, there were some differences. One, Juliana dated this guy for four years as opposed to three months. Also, Juliana's now-husband is neither a background dancer, nor baby daddy, nor a failed white rapper. Lastly, Juliana and spouse went a little further than Brit and K-Fed's honeymoon in Fiji by spending their first few weeks of newlywed bliss in Sydney, Australia with a sidetrip to the Whitsunday Islands. For the rest of the week, she'll be telling you where she stayed and whether or not it was honeymoon appropriate. So, if you have any questions about honeymoon or Australia travel, send 'em our way.
Yesterday, we went a little gung-ho on our review of the Hayman Island Resort but we saved the best for last--the video tour of Beach Front Villa #7. Enjoy. And actually, this video displays some of our finest camera work. Except for the five seconds we tried to record the view in the dark.
Related Stories:
· The Honeymooners Down Under: Hayman Island Resort, Part Two [HotelChatter]
· The Honeymooners Down Under: Hayman Island Resort, Part Three [HotelChatter]
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The Honeymooners Down Under: Hayman Island Resort, Part Three
HotelChatter's Senior Editor Juliana borrowed a page from vintage Britney Spears' 2004 playbook and got hitched after a brief engagement. Juliana and spouse went a little further than Brit and K-Fed's honeymoon in Fiji by spending their first few weeks of newlywed bliss in Sydney, Australia with a sidetrip to the Whitsunday Islands. For the rest of the week, she'll be telling you where she stayed and whether or not it was honeymoon appropriate. So, if you have any questions about honeymoon or Australia travel, send 'em our way.
In Parts One and Two of our Hayman Island Resort review, we detailed the resort's killer view and decidely not-so-killer pool-access room. Read on through to find out what else the resort had to offer, provided there was good weather.
More on the Hayman Island Resort after the jump.
Honeymooners Down Under / Island Resort Reviews / Honeymoon Hotels / → All Tags
The Honeymooners Down Under: Hayman Island Resort, Part Two
HotelChatter's Senior Editor Juliana borrowed a page from vintage Britney Spears' 2004 playbook and got hitched after a brief engagement. Juliana and spouse went a little further than Brit and K-Fed's honeymoon in Fiji by spending their first few weeks of newlywed bliss in Sydney, Australia with a sidetrip to the Whitsunday Islands. For the rest of the week, she'll be telling you where she stayed and whether or not it was honeymoon appropriate. So, if you have any questions about honeymoon or Australia travel, send 'em our way.
After six days in Sydney, we finally had enough of the urban experience and headed to the Whitsunday Islands which are about a two and a half hours away to the Great Barrier Reef.
Little did we know that this was officially the off-season for the Hayman Island, where we decided to stay for three days. While we had near perfect weather in Sydney (about 75 degrees with a slight touch of humidity), the weather did not cooperate when we were at Hayman. We were rained out for two of the three days we were there.
But it wasn't just the rain that put a damper on our moods. The Hayman Island Resort was definitely not what we expected from the #1 resort in all of Australia, and New Zealand, as awarded by Travel + Leisure. Despite a friendly and helpful staff, there were some issues with our room by the pool, the facilities are in dire need of a renovation and the cockatoos constantly hovering above drove us crazy.
More on the Hayman Island Resort after the jump.
Killer View / Honeymooners Down Under / Island Resort Reviews / Honeymoon Hotels / → All Tags
The Honeymooners Down Under: Killer View from Hayman Island
HotelChatter's Senior Editor Juliana borrowed a page from vintage Britney Spears' 2004 playbook and got hitched after a brief engagement. Juliana and spouse went a little further than Brit and K-Fed's honeymoon in Fiji by spending their first few weeks of newlywed bliss in Sydney, Australia with a sidetrip to the Whitsunday Islands. For the rest of the week, she'll be telling you where she stayed and whether or not it was honeymoon appropriate. So, if you have any questions about honeymoon or Australia travel, send 'em our way.
This was the killer view from Beach Front Villa #7 at the Hayman Island Resort in Australia. Located about two and a half hours outside Sydney (you take a plane to Great Barrier Reef airport, then a boat to Hayman), the island is amidst the Whitsunday Islands in the Great Barrier Reef. Nothing else exists on this island except for the resort and staff quarters. Which makes it pretty ideal.
Indeed the resort is a consistent favorite of Travel+Leisure but we're not sure it's quite up to speed. Stick around for our full review of the resort coming later today where we report on the good, the bad and those damn cockatoos.
Related Stories:
· Killer View, Hayman Island [YouTube]
· Honeymooners Down Under [HotelChatter]
Honeymoon Hotels / Sydney Hotel Reviews / Honeymooners Down Under / Westin Hotels / Hotel VIdeo Tours / → All Tags
The Honeymooners Down Under: Popping into the Westin Sydney
HotelChatter's Senior Editor Juliana borrowed a page from vintage Britney Spears' 2004 playbook and got hitched after a brief engagement. Juliana and spouse went a little further than Brit and K-Fed's honeymoon in Fiji by spending their first few weeks of newlywed bliss in Sydney, Australia with a sidetrip to the Whitsunday Islands. For the rest of the week, she'll be telling you where she stayed and whether or not it was honeymoon appropriate. So, if you have any questions about honeymoon or Australia travel, send 'em our way.
Here's another amateur video we shot while on honeymoon in Sydney. This was our first day in town and we were in search of a spa since both the spas at the Park Hyatt and the Four Seasons were all booked up.
Walking into the Westin Sydney in the city's Central Business District was the furthest thing from a honeymoon stop. Everyone was conducting business meetings at the lobby's little atrium bar. Also, you need to have a serious business job to pay the starter cocktail price of $18.
So the hotel is definitely not honeymoon appropriate but is, as most Westins tend to be, a great business travel hotel. Recently, Travel+Leisure picked it as the #1 hotel in Sydney on their 500 List for 2007. And as we reported this morning, you can apparently take a tour of the hotel's historic lobby which used to be a post office.
In the end, we did find a pretty cool spa in the Westin Hotel building, but not affiliated with the Westin, called Endota which was full of young and happy people eager to rub our feet. Well, maybe not that eager.
Related Stories:
· Westin Wants You To Unwind [HotelChatter]
· Westin Hotel Lobby, Sydney [YouTube]
Tags: Honeymoon Hotels / Sydney Hotel Reviews / Honeymooners Down Under / → All Tags
The Honeymooners Down Under: Not Quite a Sex Tape
HotelChatter's Senior Editor Juliana borrowed a page from vintage Britney Spears' 2004 playbook and got hitched after a brief engagement. However, there were some differences. One, Juliana dated this guy for four years as opposed to three months. Also, Juliana's now-husband is neither a background dancer, nor baby daddy, nor a failed white rapper. Lastly, Juliana and spouse went a little further than Brit and K-Fed's honeymoon in Fiji by spending their first few weeks of newlywed bliss in Sydney, Australia with a sidetrip to the Whitsunday Islands. For the rest of the week, she'll be telling you where she stayed and whether or not it was honeymoon appropriate. So, if you have any questions about honeymoon or Australia travel, send 'em our way.
This is actually just a one-minute video tour of Room 130 at the Observatory Hotel in Sydney. Read our full review from yesterday to get the full effect. And yes, we know our camera skills are awful.
Related Stories:
· The Honeymooners Down Under [HotelChatter]
Honeymoon Hotels / Sydney Hotel Reviews / Honeymooners Down Under / Orient-Express Hotels / → All Tags
The Honeymooners Down Under: The Observatory Hotel
HotelChatter's Senior Editor Juliana borrowed a page from vintage Britney Spears' 2004 playbook and got hitched after a brief engagement. Juliana and spouse went a little further than Brit and K-Fed's honeymoon in Fiji by spending their first few weeks of newlywed bliss in Sydney, Australia with a sidetrip to the Whitsunday Islands. For the rest of the week, she'll be telling you where she stayed and whether or not it was honeymoon appropriate. So, if you have any questions about honeymoon or Australia travel, send 'em our way.
Unfortunately, we checked out of our first hotel in Sydney, the Park Hyatt, all too soon, as we missed Sylvester Stallone and his goumbas allegedly throwing growth hormones things out of their hotel window. So you must be wondering if our next hotel had such excitement? Hmm...not quite.
Click through to read the full Observatory Hotel review
Celebrity Scoop / Honyemoon Hotels / Sydney Hotel Reviews / Honeymooners Down Under / → All Tags
Honeymooners Down Under Check Out as Sylvester Stallone and Hormones Check In
As part of our Honeymooners Down Under feature, we will be filling you in on what hotels we visited while on honeymoon to Sydney these past couple of weeks. However, we interrupt your regularly scheduled programming here to fill you in on some celeb scoop while we were checking out of the Park Hyatt Sydney.
We checked out on Saturday, February 17th and headed over to the Observatory Hotel (full report to come later today). But even after settling in our near hotel, we sort of missed hanging around the Rocks area so we headed back near the Park Hyatt to eat and shop at the weekly Rocks market which happens to be next to a Holiday Inn.
As we passed this budget hotel we noticed a beefy, greasy, man with an obvious black hair dye job wearing shades and barking into a cellphone. Clustered nearby were a bunch of meatheads. Put it this way, if this were the Jersey Shore, these guys would fit right in.
The full Rambo after the jump.
Honeymoon Hotels / Sydney Hotel Reviews / Hyatt Hotels / Honeymooners Down Under / HotelChatter Reviews / → All Tags
The Honeymooners Down Under: The Park Hyatt Sydney
HotelChatter's Senior Editor Juliana borrowed a page from vintage Britney Spears' 2004 playbook and got hitched after a brief engagement. Juliana and spouse went a little further than Brit and K-Fed's honeymoon in Fiji by spending their first few weeks of newlywed bliss in Sydney, Australia with a sidetrip to the Whitsunday Islands. For the rest of the week, she'll be telling you where she stayed and whether or not it was honeymoon appropriate. So, if you have any questions about honeymoon or Australia travel, send 'em our way.
Many of you may be asking why we chose Sydney as our honeymoon destination. Well, let's put it this way-- when the thought of going to Hawaii, the standard honeymoon destination, bores you, it's time you headed someplace really far away. Another reason for Sydney is that we aren't exactly the type who enjoys spending seven days on a beach doing nothing. Thus Sydney was a great choice because it offered both the urban experience and a beach scene (Hello, Bondi!) Also, the timing was right as Australia is just winding down its summer which meant it would be nice and hot. And lastly, we have always wanted to go to Australia and when else would we have the time to take 10 days off to go?
Our first stop was the Park Hyatt Sydney which we booked solely because it was where Kate Hudson and Owen Wilson hooked up. We know, we have no shame. But it was also the #2 hotel on TripAdvisor when we were booking and being the luxury arm of the Hyatt Hotel chain, we knew the stay would be good. Just how good? Find out after the jump.
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