Intercontinental Mark Hopkins SF

Stayed here for 1 night 10/28-10/29/07. Booked for $150 thru hotwire. Nice looking outside appearance. Standard rooms, which is what you get with most hotwire bookings, were assigned to only the 1st and 2nd floor out of 19 floors. I was able to get the 5th floor which considered an upgrade. Nice room, but not very good view. Parking was $45 plus tax, valet only. I had read that Masonic Building (1 block away) was $30 per day plus tax. I drove there but there was a jazz concert at that time so parking was completely full. I had no other option but to valet. Parking is not coordinated very well with hotel. Hotel never charged me anything. Thank goodness.

Hotwire Hotel Booking Experience

Hotwire booking today for one night in San Francisco from 10/28 to 10/29. Hotwire only lists price, amenities and star rating. You book and then hotwire sends you the hotel information. You can try to guess the hotel based on the amenities and location hints. I checked the hotel listings on http://www.betterbidding.com/ before I booked. Several hotels were listed.

Looked only for 4 star or above (below were the choices):

Union Square West $100 + 22.05 Tax = $122.05 Total (Clift Hotel or Parc 55?)
Union Square East $115+21.97 Tax= $136.97 Total (Westin St. Francis?)
Embarcadero $203+$35.41= $238.41 Total (Hyatt or Omni)
Nob Hill $125+24.4 Tax = $149 Total

I was 99.9% sure that the Nob Hill Hotel was the Intercontinental Mark Hopkins hotel and I was right. I stayed at the Fairmont SF Nob Hill Hotel last year which had spectacular views of the city. The hills are steep from Union Square to Nob Hill, but it was easy taking a taxi cab or cable car.

I chose to use Hotwire rather than Priceline name your own price because priceline's hotel listings were so broad and it was hard to narrow the selection down and figure out what hotel it was. Since there were only a select few Nob Hill Hotels which Hotwire listed separately. Priceline lumped Nob Hill hotels with Union Square West.

You're most likely to get a better price for the same hotel thru priceline. Last year, I booked a USE hotel thru priceline and got the Omni Hotel San Francisco. It was about 7-10 blocks away from Union Square which I wasn't too happy about. List of hotels for previous priceline hotel winners are listed on both http://www.betterbidding.com/ and http://www.bidfortravel.com/. List of hotels for previous hotwire bookings are listed on http://www.bidfortravel.com/.

A Taste of China - Friendly Planet Tour

I wasn't sure which one was better, Friendly Planet or Smartours. A friend had took a honeymoon trip to Australia last year thru Smartours. She enjoyed it so much with the tour that she booked another vacation with Smartours to some parts of Asia. She said the hotels were pretty good. The prices definitely seem reasonable and it's so convenient b/c everything is planned for you, including airfare on some tours. I know how much a headache it is to plan a vacation since I've planned many on my own. The prices for Friendly Planet & Smartours (give or take $100) were about the same for the tour I was interested in to China (10 day trip to Beijing (5 nights), Xian (3 nights) and Shanghai (2 nights). I was interested in March 19-28 tour which was priced at $1399 ($300 discount if booked by Nov 2), including airfare from Los Angeles/all transporation, hotel and 12 meals. Additional fees:

Taxes and Fees: $120
China Visa: $130
Optional Travel Insurance: $129
Airfare schedule on Air China

LAX to Beijing: 12:40 am to 5:40 am (next day) 12.40 hours
Shanghai to Beijing: 4:55 pm to 7:30 pm 2.35 hours
Beijing to LAX: 9 pm to 5 pm (same day) 12 hours.

Total: $1779. Still sounds cheap.