Now that we've had a chance to pour over Conde Nast's Readers' Choice Awards, we noticed an Oregon hotel that didn't pop up when we wandered through the Oregon Hotel Trail. The Stephanie Inn, say CNT's readers, is the third best hotel in the country, after the Chicago outposts of the Ritz-Carlton and The Peninsula.
So what makes it so special? Good question: CN Traveler doesn't spell out any details. And the survey is just a numerical ranking, leaving us curious as to what makes the Stephanie so praiseworthy. On Tripadvisor, reviewers come to a consensus:
This Inn is probably great if you can pay $600/night for a view room. It is also great if you like a lot of pretension. You will see more people here in slacks than in beach clothes and we were definitely the youngest people there.
The Stephanie certainly has a great view of Haystack Rock, but aside from that, we're just not seeing the appeal. Also, how can a hotel not have online reservations??
Travelodge UK has once again put out another wacky hotel survey, this time involving nude sleepwalkers. Yup, nude sleepwalkers and they are mostly men. Even more scary, the number of men sleepwalking is on the rise, increasing by sevenfold since last year's survey.
An astounding 95% of the hotel chain's sleepwalkers have been naked men. These night time sleeping wanderers were found in Travelodge reception areas across the UK, requesting the following information:
- Where is the bathroom
- Can I check out as I am late for work
- Do you have a copy of todays paper
One naked male sleepwalker even managed to get himself locked out of the hotel and later arrested.
Hmm...if we had to guess which of the three reasons for nude sleepwalkers was most compelling we would have to say alcohol abuse. C'mon...we all had that friend in college who whenever they got too drunk removed some article of clothing.
Anyways, Travelodge is sending out notices to its employees on how to deal with nude sleepwalkers. One such piece of advice is to keep a supply of towels at the front desk. We say also remind guests that there are security cameras around the hotel. Maybe that will sink into their subconscious and force them to at least put on some pants before they sleepwalk around.
It's that time of the year again when Conde Nast Traveler unveils its Readers Choice awards.
Topping the list for the best U.S. city was San Francisco who has won this distinction for 17 of the past 18 years. Whoa. Good thing San Francisco has a ton of hotels for all of its happy visitors.
So who was #1? The Hotel La Scalinatella, Capri, Italy. If there's anyone who wants to take us there so we can experience this place for ourselves, we will gladly accept.
We've seen plenty of hotel surveys that cover guest satisfaction and brand preferences, but this Lost and Bound July one from Kayak gets extra credit for pushing the envelope.
Where else can you see how many people have booked rooms by the hour and what odd things were left in their rooms by other guests?
A few days ago Zagat, publisher of handy restaurant and hotel guides, released the results of a new hotel survey. Amanresorts, Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, and Raffles were the top four chains, showing those Asians know a thing or two about providing good service. It didn't stop there though: Asian chains Oberoi and Shangri-La made the top-10 as well.
Seven of the top-10 in the Small Hotels, Resorts & Inns category were in Asia, but the top one was Singita in South Africa, pictured here, which was also cited as having the best rooms. The best large hotel was Four Seasons George V in Paris, while the best resort was the Four Seasons in Hualalai, Hawaii.
A few wild card winners include three resorts in Los Cabos, Mexico, Inn at Little Washington (near D.C.) for cuisine, and a hotel in Vegas--Vegas baby! OK, it was the Four Seasons again, but still...
While we always take these surveys with a grain of salt--even we haven't seen more than a fraction of the best hotels all over the world--but you can't say they didn't try to get a good sampling. "The guide is based on the experiences of 21,783 frequent travelers and 1,626 professional travel agents who averaged 36.9 hotel nights per year."
And since we're highlighted the sorry state of WiFi in a lot of hotels this week, we can't resist this quote: "Zagat surveyors (23%) say the amenities offered have the greatest impact on their choice of hotel, with their favorite in-room feature -- the now nearly ubiquitous WiFi access (66% of business travelers say it's most important)." MOST important--hear that people? It's not an extra service you ream people on; it's up there with hot water and a door that locks.
Can a Luxury Hotel be only four-tenths of a point shy of perfection? The Conde Nast Top 100 says that's the case with the Four Seasons Bali at Sayan.
It takes a while to get through all the travel magazines stacked up under the coffee table, especially when we know we've got a lot of purse and watch ads to slog through to find the articles. So we're just getting around to digesting the Top-100 hotels list Conde Nast Traveler published a few months back. Fortunately you can find it here on Concierge.com, without your hands smelling like perfume afterwards.
We take these reader's polls with a huge grain of salt, because it's obvious from the results that you get people voting for places they'd like to visit someday or a hotel where they had afternoon tea once and thought it was lovely. What caught our eye on this one though was the score for Four Seasons Bali at Sayan. A 99.6 out of 100.
It's hard for any hotel to please all the people all the time and to have staff so perfectly trained and content that nobody ever slips and annoys a guest. This place has apparently figured it all out.
So for $460 a night, what do they serve up with that slice of perfection? Personal service, first of all: there are only 18 suites and 42 villas, all filled with high-end Balinese furniture, hardwood floors, French doors opening onto a terrace, and all the expected Four Seasons amenities. A fantastic spa is a given and several pools and plunge pools look over the forest and valley. This is meant to be a place to unwind with nature: it's in the interior of Bali, not at the beach, so yoga and meditation classes are held regularly.
When it comes to making guests happy, this Four Seasons---one of many on that top-100 list---is at the head of the class.
Now, we are sure that Americans are also leaving behind some funky stuff when they check-out of hotel rooms (hello, Rudy Giuliani?), but so far, the Brits are the only ones to document it.
Travelodge UK likes to keep a running tab of the most items left behind in a single year. Here's the results for 2006:
According to Travelodge, the 10 most common items left behind are mobile phones and chargers; toiletries; clothing items; shoes; books; hen/stag night accessories/adult toys; jewellery/watches; laptops; electrical gadgets, including iPod and digital cameras; false teeth and artificial limbs.
Nothing here is too surprising, although one hotel reports a suitcase stuffed with collectible celebrity sunglasses (like ones worn by Elton John) was once left behind, as was keys to expensive cars and a soccer team's massage tables.
And believe it or not, artificial limbs do include wooden peg legs.
Last week we pointed to the results of a TripAdvisor survey of business travelers. This week we get a new survey courtesy of the current issue of Condé Nast Travel.
The average traveler in this survey spends around 50 nights a year away from home on business. Findings show that 93 percent travel with a cell phone and 63 percent travel with a laptop. "Somewhat surprisingly, though, only 16 percent pack a BlackBerry or other portable e-mail device." (Perhaps success is inversely related to how obsessed you are with your e-mail? Hmmmm...)
As for hotels, with the magazine running lots of ads for the likes of Rolex and Prada, it's probably no surprise that Best Western didn't make this list. Hong Kong apparently knows how to run hotels: The Peninsula chain came in first and the Mandarin Oriental chain came in third. In second place was the Four Seasons, which had the highest rank in the food category. (Peninsula won the other four categories.) Next up was Ritz-Carlton and fifth was Starwood's Luxury Collection.
So what really matters to these travelers? Here the list wasn't so radically different than the TripAdvisor survey's. Location was the most important, at 88% of respondents. This was followed by comfortable beds, price, security, service, and high-speed Internet access. All the other items received less than 40%, with the business center, spa, and bars/lounges pulling up the rear. They were ranked as "very important" by 10% of respondents or less.
Last week we pointed to the results of a TripAdvisor 
