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Tim Leffel / Guanajuato Hotels / San Miguel De Allende Hotels / → All Tags

The Guanajuanto and San Miguel De Allende Hotel Scene Rundowns

The Villa Maria Cristina in Guanajuato, Mexico.

If you haven't been paying attention these past two weeks, HotelChatter contributing editor Tim Leffel has been recapping the Guanajuanto and San Miguel de Allende Hotel Scenes for us.

Since it's a lot of great information including photos and videos, we want to make sure you guys get to read and see it all. Thus, here's the master list of his stories for you to work off of when planning your trips:

Guanajuato Hotels
· Villa Maria Cristina
· Hotel Castillo Santa Cecilia
· Quinta Las Acacias

San Miguel de Allende
· Dos Casa
· Casa de Sierra Nevada
· Casa Luna B&B
· Hotel Casa Linda

Still have more questions about where to stay and what to do? Send us an email and will have Tim write you back with his answers.

Mexico Hotels / Guanajuato Hotel Guide / Hotel Video Tours / Tim Leffel / → All Tags

Guanajuato Hotel Guide: La Casa de Espiritus Alegres

Where: La Ex-Hacienda La Trinidad #1, Colonial Marfil, Guanajuato, Mexico

Once again, HotelChatter contributing editor Tim Leffel is moving around Mexico, checking out the hotel scene in the colonial heartland. If you have a question about where to stay in Guanajuato or San Miguel de Allende, hit us on the tipline, or just comment below, and we will do our best to get you some sort of answer. Enjoy.

Imagine you had traveled around Mexico for a decade or so, buying every piece of folk art that caught your eye. Now imagine you opened a bed and breakfast and had a chance to stuff every one of those masks, paintings, and Day of the Dead figures into seven rooms, a dining area, and a lobby lounge/library. Then imagine that you also took trips to Rajasthan, India now and then and you decided to jam all those souvenirs into one suite and a garden lounge area while you were at it.

The result would be La Casa de Espiritus Alegres, a trippy hotel in the village of Marfil, on the edge of Guanajuato in Mexico. Set in shady gardens and made up of buildings that date as far back as the 1700s. You can't look in any direction here without seeing something interesting. It gives the phrase "a hotel with personality" a whole new meaning and here there really is a skeleton in the closet--in every room!

Rates run $145 to $165, including taxes and a magnificent full breakfast. See the video tour here for a taste, then check out their website for a pics of each room and suite.

Hungary Hotel Guide / Budapest Hotel Guide / Tim Leffel / → All Tags

Hungary Hotels Rundown: The New York Palace in Budapest

Where: Erzsébet krt. 9-11, 1073, Budapest, Hungary

HotelChatter Contributing Editor Tim Leffel recently completed a sojourn to Hungary the other week and has dutifully reported back to us on the hotel scene in Budapest. This week we'll be running all of his stories so if you have any questions about Hungary accommodations, hit us on the tipline, or just comment below, and we will do our best to get you some sort of answer.

Why go to Hungary and stay in a hotel called New York Palace? Well, the name here is not some aspiration to match the Big Apple. The building was originally built by the New York Insurance Company and the New York Café on the bottom floor was a happening meeting place in Budapest's heyday at the end of the 1800s.

After the building sat abandoned for 10 years, new owners Boscolo Hotels bought it and turned it into a recently opened hotel. Of the total 180 rooms, 100 are open now and 80 will be finished in '08.

Depending on your view of Renaissance Baroque style, the restored café is either breathtaking or a visual overload, with all the gaudy glory of the gilded age shining again. It meanders into several sections on different floors, with a cigar bar, a formal restaurant, and the main room for coffee and Hungarian pastries.

The bright lobby occupies a space that used to be a courtyard, with glass now overhead. Architects effectively matched the historic style of the rest of the structure, a building constructed when banks and insurance companies tried hard to show off their wealth with marble and lots of ornamentation.

The spa here gets away from the historic feel, going instead for an "ice cave" look: think curvy white plaster and blue lights in the treatment rooms, lap pool, and gym. Rooms range from standards with designer fabric and Italian marble baths to an over-the-top Royal Suite that mixes Murano chandeliers with wall-mounted big-screen HDTVs.

With rates running from around $250 to $3,000, the Italian owners have priced it for those with plenty of Prada and Armani in their wardrobe.