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Pacific Coast Highway Hotels Get Their Own App

Ready to take your next West Coast road trip to the next level? Check out this $0.99 iPhone/iPad app by GuideGecko, which organizes over 200 hotels—by state—along the 1,250 mile journey from San Diego to Seattle. And for all you jet-setting winos, there is even a special category built for California Wine Country.

While travel guidebooks can certainly be helpful in providing local info, listings, and some photos, no 500-page Lonely Planet can ever become as fully integrated (or as lightweight) as an app like this. Want to call and check availability? You're already on your phone. Want to book online? Tap away. Got lost along the way? All of the maps can be accessed offline.

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Hotel Contests / Astoria Hotels / Oregon Hotels / Goonies Hotels / Goonies / → All Tags

'Goonies Never Say Die'...When It Comes to Winning a Free Hotel Stay

Where: 10 Basin Street [map], Astoria, OR, United States, 97103

Watch out for those booty traps.

It's already well-established that Goonies is the best rainy day movie ever and anyone who was a kid in the 80s can probably recite the movie line-for line at any given time. (Our favorite? "Up there is their time but down here, it's our time.") So how can we not love this new contest which is combining two of our favorite things--Goonies and hotel rooms.

The Cannery Pier Hotel in Astoria, Ore., where Goonies was filmed, is offering Goonies fans the chance to win a two-night stay at the hotel, along with dinner for you and Troy, er, your friend/lover/spouse at the Bridgewater Bistro, drinks and dessert at the Astoria Coffee house and a travel voucher for either airfare or gas (depending on where the winner lives.)

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HotelChatter Reviews / Provenance Hotels / Photo Gallery / Portland Hotel Reviews / Oregon Hotels / → All Tags

Pad Thai and Body Pillows at the Hotel Lucia and Hotel deLuxe

If you've never heard of them before, Provenance Hotels is a small boutique chain based out of Portland, Ore., with just five hotels in Oregon, Washington, and Tennessee (not to mention a new location in San Francisco at the Hotel Frank).

Last week, we got the opportunity to check out two of their Portland hotels, the Hotel Lucia and the Hotel deLuxe.

Located blocks from each other in Portland's steadily growing downtown area, both hotels are housed in converted buildings from the 1900s, and both offer clean, artsy rooms with incredible service. In fact, if it weren't for the added glitziness and brighter colors of the deLuxe, we might have had a hard time telling them apart.

Read below to get the full scoop, and find out what tipped the scales!

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Hotel Packages / Hotel Deals / Portland Hotel Scene / Oregon Hotels / Ace Hotels / Shopping Packages / → All Tags

Stick It To The Man With the Help of Ace Portland

Where: 1022 SW Stark St [map], Portland, OR, United States, 97205

There’s nowt like getting discounts on your shopping, and nowt like going with the flow in a place like Portland and getting all chippy against The Man, so the new holiday shopping package that the Ace Portland has just launched is getting us even more excited than the moment on our first trip there that we were told there was no sales tax in Oregon.

The Stick It To The Man package goes one stage further and offers you 10 percent off a standard room, 10 percent off things you buy at the Ace (including yummy Malin + Goetz smellies) and 10 percent off purchases from a selection of local retailers.

The discount is good for 35 independent shops in Portland including Billygoat Vintage, Muse Art and Design and Camellia Pure Beauty. And if you don’t know what these are, fear not, because they’ll also slip you a copy of eat.shop Portland to navigate your way around the beacons of hipsterdom.

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Snapshot / Hotel Art / Portland Hotel Scene / Starwood Hotels / Luxury Collection Hotels / Oregon Hotels / → All Tags

Naked Lady Alert In the Lobby of The Nines, Portland

Where: 525 SW Morrison [map], Portland, OR, United States, 97204

Ok so we knew Portland, Oregon has a reputation of being uber-hip and all, but nakedness in the lobby is something we definitely didn’t expect to encounter – especially as we were staying in swanky Luxury Collection property, The Nines.

But as we came out of the elevator at the eighth floor to make our way to the check in desk, we were confronted by shop mannequins without any clothes on. Whew!

There were three of them round one side of the check in desk, and another one in a flasher’s pose on the way into the atrium and the restaurant Urban Farmer.

Sadly, they were all ladies. Even sadder, the theme did not continue into our bedroom. Although that’s probably for the best – we can only imagine what people might do with them if they did.

Modern art, eh?

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Hotel Amenities / Hotel Services / Killer View / Astoria Hotels / Oregon Hotels / → All Tags

Astoria's Cannery Pier Hotel Wants To Make Shipspotters Out Of You

Where: 10 Basin St [map], Astoria, OR, United States, 97103

Of all the things we’d expect to find in a hotel room, a shipping guide is fairly low down the list. But this is what was sitting on the coffee table in our room at the Cannery Pier Hotel in Astoria, Oregon at the weekend.

The hotel is bang on the Columbia river (we actually mean on it – it’s perched on a little jetty and you feel like you’re floating on the river from the rooms) right continuous truss bridge (we’re not sure what that is, but it’s pretty splendid to look at).

All the rooms have balconies overlooking the river and they’re all stocked with a pair of binoculars. But we found that what was far more fun than zooming in on the seagulls was watching the river.

Every morning the front desk prints out copies of the ship report, listing which ships will be traveling the river that day, their routes, and what they’re carrying, and this leaflet goes into even more detail about the different types of vessels that ply the river with tips on how to tell them apart (a car carrier has extremely high sides, for example).

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Snapshot / Hotel Amenities / Oregon Hotels / → All Tags

Kick It Old School On Vintage Bikes at Cannery Pier

Where: 10 Basin St. [map], Astoria, OR, United States, 97103

Aww. Don't you sometimes just wish you could hop on a 50's style bike and ride up and down the pier and only stop to eat ice cream cones and kiss your significant other and stuff like that? Well, you can fulfill your only-in-the-movies-style fantasies at the Oregon Coast's adorably-charming (but pretty big — we mean "charming" as in playful and quirky, not in the Craigslist-esque, this-place-is-small way) Cannery Pier Hotel.

Embark Creative snapped this sweet shot of the fleet of 50's-style bikes available to guests at the Cannery Pier in Astoria, located in the Northwest corner of Oregon. They are, admittedly, "50's-replica" bikes, but they're offered up at no fee for guests to use to explore the city (the oldest settlement West of the Rockies) via a four-mile path along the Columbia river.

Rooms here start around $229, and TripAdvisor reviewers are all about the views, views, views from this place.

[Photo: Embark Creative]

Hotel Hype / Oregon Hotels / Wine Tasting Hotels / → All Tags

Luxury Lodgings to Arrive In Oregon's Wine Country

Where: 2525 Allison Lane [map], Newberg, OR, United States, 97132

Despite its $1 billion industry, Oregon’s wine country is still something of a mystery compared to better known regions like Napa and Sonoma, and lodging options have been limited to small B&B’s, farmhouses and inns. By August 2009, though, oenophiles in search of luxury among the vines will have a new option at the Allison Inn and Spa in Yamhill County, just 20 miles southwest of Portland.

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Movie Set Hotels / Hotel Parties / Hotel News / Twilight Hotels / Oregon Hotels / → All Tags

Attend Edward and Bella's Prom at The View Point Inn

Where: 40301 East Larch Mountain Rd [map], Corbett, OR, United States, 97019

Yesterday we told you about hotels where Twilight the book was set and how they're smartly stealing the money from crazed fans.

Today we bring to you news about the where the Twilight movie was filmed. We know all you crazed fans already saw the movie at midnight last night, which is why tonight you should go to Edward & Bella's Prom at The View Point Inn. That's right, instead of seeing the movie again (you can do that tomorrow), you can live the movie by attending the prom where the prom scene was filmed. We can't believe it either.

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Hotel Deals / Portland Hotel Scene / Hotel Packages / Twilight / Oregon Hotels / → All Tags

Save Big with Portland Hotel Packages

Where: Portland, OR, United States

Local treats found at the Nines Hotel

Thanks to the magic of Google, we recently stumbled upon some greeeeeeeat (said like Tony the Tiger) Portland, Oregon deals. In fact, there is a whole website dedicated to giving you deals: TravelPortland.com.

Their year-round Big Deal hotel packages offer something invaluable on the downtown streets: free parking. Wait, we didn't say that loud enough. FREE PARKING.

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Portland Hotel Scene / McMenamins Hotels / Hotel Construction / Hotel Delays / Hotel Renovations / Oregon Hotels / → All Tags

Hotel Louie Still a Hard Hat Zone

Where: 303 S.W. 12th Ave. [map], Portland, OR, United States, 97205

While in Portland, we decided to hit up the famed Oregon hoteliers, McMenamins for a tour of their forthcoming newest property. It will become a hotel, but right now it's a bit, well, scrappy.

The website describes it at the "New Downtown Hotel" but we have it on good word from an inside source that they've finally decided on a name. The new Hotel Louie is named after the former owner of the Crystal Ballroom down the street and linked with the property.

Like most of the McMenamins properties, the building is steeped in history. It's been everything from a hotel (Hotel Alma, Hotel Georgian, Hotel Tait, Majestic Hotel) to a mens' bath house (which has earned the property quite a reputation among Portlanders), a night club, a car dealership, and the list goes on. When the property was purchased there was a lot of cleaning out to be done.

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Hotel Restaurants / Portland Hotel Scene / Ace Hotels / Oregon Hotels / → All Tags

Eats at the Ace Hotel in Portland

Where: 1022 SW Stark Street [map], Portland, OR, United States, 97205

While the Ace Hotels readies for it NYC Opening, Abigail checked in on the Portland location.

While we may have been sleeping at The Nines on our recent trip to Portland, we couldn't help but heading over to the Ace, a long-time HotelChatter love, and take our picture in the photo booth. We also had a chance to check out the other resident's of the Ace building: Clyde Commons, a restaurant, and Stumptown Coffee, a coffee shop.

Two words: Very. Yes.

First of all, genius to have both extending right off the lobby. There are coffee shops on every block in Portland, so this a great way to keep guests from spending their money elsewhere. Plus, Stumptown fits perfectly with the snobby, awesome, hipster vibe the Ace has going. (Stumptown will also be providing the beans for the new Ace New York.)

Second, we would (and did, obviously) eat dinner at Clyde even if we weren't staying the hotel. The food is that good. Three cheers for the squash ravioli!

We're really liking what the Ace brand is doing. Here's hoping as they keep expanding, they can keep it up.