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The Avatar Hotel: A New Geek Hotel in Silicon Valley for $99 a Night

Where: 4200 Great America Parkway [map], Santa Clara, CA, United States, 95054

You don’t have to be a “Second Life” fanboy to take advantage of the Avatar Hotel’s $99 opening rate. Joie De Vivre’s sixth Silicon Valley property is opening in a former Holiday Inn this month with 168 rooms, and claims to be the only boutique hotel in Santa Clara. For you non-geeks, Santa Clara is home to Yahoo!, Cisco, Intel, Sun Microsystems, and McAfee.

The hotel is targeted toward “tech road warriors,” with a network of techie amenities “designed to appeal to start-up entrepreneurs as well as established technology gurus.” Rooms come with complimentary wired and wireless internet access, laptop tables for working in bed, iPod docking stations and 37-inch flat screens.

There’s also a new fitness center, a heated outdoor pool and Jacuzzi (only open April-October), and what just might be the most awesome free hotel food event we’ve come across lately: Wednesday night “Beer & Brats” barbecues with free microbrews and hot dogs for guests from 7:00-9:00pm.

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Tags: Hotel News / → All Tags

Westin Santa Clara and the Angry Picketers

Where: 5101 Great America Parkway [map], Santa Clara, CA, United States, 95054

Amy from NewYorkology forwards us a tense experience between the Westin Santa Clara, some picketers, and a blogher attendant.

Four or five people were standing in front of the entrance handing out fliers and yelling at the people walking inside. They said The Westin was evil and that we should not stay there support such a bad company. One woman was really screaming at another who apparently had mouthed off to her. I was tense already - walking into to a pack of screaming protesters was the last thing I wanted to do. I kept my head down and politely accepted the flier as it was handed to me. Luckily, I did not get yelled at.

When I FINALLY got inside and laid down on my bed, I pulled out the flier to
read it. It said that, "The Westin Santa Clara is under a strict boycott by local, community, faith, labor & student groups." Then it went on to describe all the atrocities the company has committed against the people who work there. It may have been a bunch of B.S., but it made me feel bad. I don't like crossing picket lines, but I sure as hell was not going to get back  into my car and look for another hotel.

Why can't west coast hoteliers and their employees just hug it out.  

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