For two days before my trip began, I checked the weather obsessively. I was connecting up to Toronto to begin my first class oneworld award. Missing the start of the trip would be a serious pain. Fortunately oneworld awards are pretty changeable, even after travel begins, but there are no changes to routing. And if I don’t even start the trip, then I’m at the mercy of award availability… from the looks of things I could fly Toronto – Hong Kong – Manila in first class the next day if I missed my outbound flight. But certainly that availability could have changed, especially with Cathay Pacific where availability sometimes seems to come and go for no logical reason at all. I certainly didn’t want my first class flight to Hong Kong to turn out to…
Trip Reports
Category Archives for Trip Reports.
Another Excellent Stay at the Westin Diplomat
Several folks asked me about this post from yesterday morning, the sunrise photo I was waking up to, where I was? It was another great stay at the Westin Diplomat. This isn’t the nicest or most refined property in Starwood, or even of theirs in South Florida. There’s a new W in Ft. Lauderdale that was tempting to check out. But this hotel offers the very best Platinum elite treatment of any property, anywhere. They have something like 86 suites in the upgrade pool, about three-quarters of which are “corner suites” — a bedroom and separate living room with small dining area and large bathroom. These suites have a wraparound balcony looking straight out at the Atlantic ocean, and to the side the ability to see the Intracoastal Waterway as well. With this many suites,…
My Choice of Property in the Fresno Hotel Wasteland
Fresno is something of a hotel wasteland. There’s a Marriott Courtyard, a couple of Holiday Inns, the local Picadilly chain (which years ago was about as nice as it got), a Radisson, a couple of La Quintas, and a well-placed Hampton. Supposedly there’s a Hyatt Place coming. Not a lot as far as full service properties go. And with a penchant for Starwood properties, I wind up at the Four Points. I wish it was further North, it is it’s on Blackstone (a main drag, across the street from a mall that’s been surpassed many times over and that’s fairly dead, and near a Starbucks and the 41 freeway) about 10 minutes from the airport. The neighborhood isn’t the best in Fresno, I lived there at one point in Northwest and this isn’t Northwest. Not…
Conrad Miami One-Bedroom Bay View Residence
Last weekend I stayed at the Conrad Miami. Hilton isn’t especially known for their Diamond treatment. Diamonds get full breakfast, access to a lounge when not on the executive floor, and promised upgrades aren’t meaningful (i.e. they don’t offer suite upgrades as part of the rules of the program). Then again, do I really count as a real Diamond? I made my status with a quick $40,000 churned through a Hilton Surpass American Express. In other words, it was earned quickly with a bit of credit card spend, not through loyalty to the chain. So I’ll take what I can get! And at the Conrad, I got more than I was paying for (a $220 rate, I believe): a one-bedroom bay view residence. Valet parking on arrival was excellent, a staff member read my luggage…
Hotel Prince de Galles 52 Euro Mistake Rate Stay
Last year the Prince de Galles hotel in Paris had a mistake rate of 52 euros per night (they intended to load a 520 euro rate). It was only available for up to 4 nights, the week of Thanksgiving. I’ve just returned from the hotel, and had a lovely stay. On check-in I was upgraded to a deluxe room on the top floor with a large balcony looking out over Paris (and if you crook your neck and look right, a view of the Eiffel Tower). I did check availability, figuring that the hotel wouldn’t provide much of an upgrade – as a result of the rate and of this being Paris, after all. The hotel wasn’t offering any suites at all online, for any of the four nights of our stay. And they were…
The Jefferson Hotel, Richmond
Nearly all of my hotel stays are with a major chain. I have status, I earn and burn points. It’s rare that I stay outside ‘the system’. That also means I don’t usually experience the very very best luxury properties, most of which also exist outside of the traditional mainstream system. Although they frequently have affiliations, whether Leading Small Hotels of the World, Tablet Hotels, or just participation in American Express Fine Hotels and Resorts or Virtuoso. But this weekend I needed to be in Richmond, and everything downtown was priced extraordinarily due to the Marathon. I could have stayed on a cheap rate at the Westin, but that was 6 miles from where I needed to be. And with the race traffic was going to be a nightmare. The Jefferson, though, was priced pretty…
View from the Wing Goes Home
Home, for me, means the Westin Diplomat. It’s not the single most modern property, the single best service, the most intimate. But as an all around hotel experience it delivers, consistently. And no other property delivers as good a value in terms of elite status recognition. Sometimes the property is very busy, but a combination of off-season and the economy means poolside chairs were much easier to come by (people do save chairs starting around 8am). Alternatively they offer pay cabanas and ‘beach cabanas’ which are covered chairs on the beach. Some folks don’t like to pay, but when there’s a shortage I do appreciate having the options. This is not a small, intimate property. But when ensconced in a suite, and visiting the club lounge frequently, it actually feels as though it is. There…
W San Diego – Extreme Wow Suite
I spent last weekend at the W San Diego, which has been in the news lately because the property is being take back by its mortgage lenders. Like many hotels, occupancy and rates are down. This one was acquired at the height of the real estate boom, fetching a real premium, and the owners decided it didn’t make sense to go on making the interest payments. So apparently they believe it’s now worth less than the $65 million they owed on it, despite having paid about 50% more than that three years ago. At the same time, with recent rates as low as $119 the hotel becomes an exceptional value. I had my own special rate, and when I checked in on Thursday night the clerk at the desk informed me that I was going…
Asiana First Class, Seoul – Los Angeles
4:30 pm Seoul, South Korea (ICN) to Los Angeles, CA (LAX) Asiana Flight 202 First Class Seats 4E, 4F Duration: 11h Boeing 747 5,999 miles traveled The last time I flew Asiana first class, in July 2007, we were escorted onto the plane skipping the planeside security check. This time we were subjected to it, but it was certainly polite. On boarding a flight attendant offered to assist with our bags, and to put them in the closet, but I prefer them in the overhead for easier access during flight. The cabin was full 4/10 including the two of us, and we had had no difficulty securing the two seats together in the cabin. Others have had much greater difficulty, Asiana seems to block much of their assignable seat inventory for some reason (perhaps because…
Back to Incheon and the Asiana First Class Lounge
We asked about late checkout from the W when we checked in – by which I mean 1pm (!) – and was told they would ‘have to see’ because they were quite full. I didn’t push, and didn’t ask again, I just took late checkout and certainly they knew I was doing so as we had reserved a hotel car for 1pm. I suppose it’s possible that the hotel had become a designated conference property listed in advance with SPG for the dates in question, and I didn’t specifically rule out that possibility, but it was sufficiently unlikely that I wasn’t worried about it. We had the same driver for our return to the airport as for our pickup. He never spoke to us on the drive to the hotel, and didn’t speak to us…
