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Awesome rate at Thistle Kensington Gardens

I was looking all over for a good hotel deal in London for a mid-May visit. I emailed Thistle hotels directly and got the following rate: The best rate we can offer you would be £33.50 for four of the nights and £67 for the remaining three nights. This rate is for a standard single room including full English breakfast tax and service.

Can you post the email address? I'm also looking for a couple of nights in May. Thanks, Barb

If you fly BA to LOndon, you can stay for two nights for $2.00 over airfare for each of two nights, double occupancy. Many of the Thistle hotels are included in the package.

The Thistle hotels email address is [email protected].

Stayed at Thistle Kensington Gardens last June. I also stressed on where to stay and this turned out to be a good choice. It is on top of a gas station (and a convenience store) and directly across the street from Kensington Gardens. The rooms were small but the bathroom room was a good size and by the end of the vacation I needed that tub to soak my aching feet. There is a bus stop directly outside and a Tube stop just down the street with another (more lines) Tube stop just another block or so. The continental breakfast was good toast, tea/coffee, rolls, cheese and ham. You can also purchase full breakfast but they fried their eggs in a big pan of oil and they did not appeal to me. There is a small lounge with a TV and bar for a nightcap. There are a number of Chinese restaurants by the Tube stops although we did not try any. We had drinks at the Pub right down the street. Restaurants we enjoyed while in London last spring. I'll list in order of preference. Unfortunately charge card bills do not have addresses and my mind is slipping so I don't recall specifically. Como Lario - Italian. Believe was in Convent Gardens. Had duck w/ cherry sauce. Not stuffy but felt a little underdressed. My husband and I had sneaks and dungarees since we were at Cantebury and Dover earlier in the day; were starving and did not want to search for some place good to eat. While not trashy maybe a little too informal. Had a couple of snobs next to us who were very vocal about their their millons but we ignored and enjoyed our dinner. This was the only restaurant we made reservations at. Could not find the place and went to a ritzy hotel for directions and their clerk was sweet enough to call for reservations and we walked right over. Wodka Restaurant Ltd. - Polish. Try the peorgies (sic). Lots of beers and, of course, vodkas. I had cider which was good. **Coupon in London for Less (Go-Today). Informal. Belgo Centraal - Belgium. Mussels and fries. Lots of different beers. I am not normally a beer drinker but liked their apple beer. Believe this was theatre district. Long tables - very informal. Alfred. English. Don't recall location but was very good. I had pork belly with potatoes and fried onion rings. Creme brulee (which I always get if its on the menu). We went late and it was empty. Another informal. Livebait. Seafood. It was our anniversary and we had their seafood tower for two and lots of wine. Was very interesting. Cockleshells - oh well. Put one of those suckers in my mouth and it popped out like a projectile. We enjoyed although a wee bit expensive. This was near Thistle Kensington Gardens. Maybe a few blocks. Had lunch at a restaurant near Kew Gardens. Right as you get off the tube. It is actually a bakery/take out and there is seating in the back. Very good. We each had "pies".

Thanks for all your suggestions on food. I have previously stayed at a Hilton and a British 4 star hotel and was wondering how this Thistle would be. I thought it was so cheap because of the current low tourism. When you say, it's on top of a gas station, do you mean, right next door?

No, they mean on top. The hotel lobby and retaurant etc are one floor up. All there is on ground level is the entrance, bell desk, elevators and stairs. I got a single rate (weekend) of £25.53 at this hotel last October, including full breakfast.

Wow! 26 pounds/night!! Was this hotel shabby or crappy in any way?? Someone on this board said the walls weren't thin and everything is ok. I'm just not hoping i'm going to be looking for another place after i check in. "You get what you pay for."

here's a post from another travel board that may help you make a decision: I stayed at this hotel Feb 28-Mar 2 2003. We took advantage of a 2 night free promotion with a British Airways roundtrip ticket. The hotel was in a nice neighborhood but not too convenient to restaurants etc. When we checked in (in late morning after our overnight flight) we were shown a smallish room with 1 (very small) double bed, when we had requested a twin (2-bed) room. We asked for a change and got a room with two twin beds. Our room was nice if oldish, with a window that opened out onto a charming side street. It had a TV and electric kettle with tea and instant coffee in the room. The room also had a large-ish bathroom with tub and shower. The staff was a bit undertrained (they were very slow in checking us in, didn't seem to know what they were doing, etc.) but generally helpful. The lobby area was really nice and seemed recently renovated. The big problem with the room was the beds which both were awful -- they sagged in the middle, to the point where we had to sleep with pillows under our lower backs. (I'm not picky, have stayed in lots of 1* hotels/hostels in Europe, and this was the worst bed I've ever encountered). We didn't complain, though, since the stay was FREE and we only stayed two nights. The deal we had also included continental breakfast (ordinary price was 10.95 GBP). This was a buffet and fairly standard, and included tea/coffee, toast, ham/cheese, cereal/yogurt, etc. For 3 GBP extra each we could have upgraded to a full English breakfast which would have had eggs, sausages, and beans. They gave us the breakfast coupons when we checked in, and it seems that some people got English breakfast coupons --I guess it just depended on what rate you had.

Message: I stayed at the Thistle Kensington Palace (next door to the Kens. Gardens hotel) on Monday night (4/7) -- a freebie, part of the BA promotion. For the price I paid (!) it was a good deal. Nice location for Kensington High Street, the Gardens, Kens. Palace. Bit of a hike to either Gloucester Rd or Kens High Street tube station. My review: I found the hotel a bit tatty round the edges and in need of renovation. More Best Western than Marriott or Hilton. Staff were pleasant, the room clean and just adequate, and I loved the big bathtub. Breakfast was very average (but since it was also free, I had no complaints.) We prefer the Millenium Baileys where we have stayed a few times -- a can't beat location for convenience, just steps from Gloucester Rd tube station. We got good rates from londontown.com: breakfast was not included, but there is coffee shop and Waitrose supermarket right there, so no problem.

Thanks for that detailed review!! Ron - did you have the same experience with the sagging beds??????

SB Travlr is mistaken. The Thistle Kensington Palace and Thistle Kensington Park are adjacent near Kensington High Street. The Thistle Kensington Gardens is on Bayswater Road. The bed was not saggy. This hotel is under discussion these days on the AOL London travel board. One correspondent, who stays there regularly, claims it was fully renovated in 1998/99. Jamilla, I think you are over-worrying this one. Unless you are incredibly picky, you should find this to be a more than adequate hotel. I would have no trouble staying there again and would consider it worth the money at up to �60. The �25 rate I got was partially a mistake; it was meant to be �30 VAT inclusive, but they accidentally advertised the VAT extra rate as the VAT included rate.

Incidently, it's right across the street from the Peter Pan playground.

Thanks Jamila! That sounds like quite a deal. This is a very interesting posting because I booked, via londontown.com a double room for 7 nights in May at the Thistle Kensington Gardens for 57 pds/night + VAT and including breakfast. I wonder now if I can get an even better rate than that if I e-mail them directly? Maybe some of the other "Thistles" may have a better deal. I've also heard that the Thistle Horseguards is the nicest one in the chain. The VAT does add quite a lot to the price so I wish that was at least included in the tariff. Any thoughts? Suggestions?

I had seen that 57 pounds per night on the Londontown website and was going to book it. In fact, I attempted to book it twice, but I was told that the system was down and to come back later. I then went to check out the Thistle hotel website and decided to email the Reservations directly just to see what kind of rate they would give me. Apparently, they work well into the night, as I did this around 11:00 pm last night. The email address is [email protected]. The guy that helped me is named Richard. Very prompt. We exchanged about 4 emails and he was giving me rates for other Thisles as well. Definitely email them directly!!

Thanks again, Jamila! I'll give it a try.