Janisj or other London Priceline zone "expert"
 

The 4* rooms in London from Feb 16-20th seems to be higher than I had hoped. How much MORE inconvenient are The City, Islington or Canary Wharf when compared to the possibility of western Kensington, or northern Regent's Park?

We will be visiting a bit all over the map.. a tour from Monument tube stop.. a visit up in Camden area, a friend in Notting Hill, The Cabinet War rooms, theater one night, a meal in Kensington, and are coming in from Gatwick.

Would you add ANY of these zones to improve chances of getting a much cheaper stay or just up the bids ( now near $100 in the more central areas)?

www.betterbidding.com

www.bidfortravel.com

will have recent priceline winning bids for LON

personally no expert but always have

just upped the bid by $5 or so every couple of days

and stay central is best Have always picked up

good central stuff under $129

like the Tower Hotel recently...the room was older

but I had a great river view right by the

Tower of London worth it for me to be within

easy waliking distance of everything.

I do add a zone sometimes but always drop the price back

to $80 if it is a less desirable area.

The key for me is to be patient ignore the priceline prompts

and bid carefully $2-5 increase several days for best deals.

Happy Hunting,

Canary Wharf is out in the sticks - great if you are a businessman, lousy if you are a tourist. Wouldn't say that Northern Regents Park is much better so don't know why you are considering it at all.

The City is close to half the tourist attractions in London (St Paul's, Tower of London, Tower Bridge, Tate Modern, Monument...) but can be quiet in the evenings and weekends as most of the businesses there are for the people who work in the area. It's also convenient for the Central and District / Circle lines.

Western Kensington sounds to me a euphemism for somewhere much further west and Islington could be anywhere.

By Northern Regent's Park I was referring to the location of the Marriott Regents Park that comes up sometimes. by w. Kensington, was referring to HiltonOlympia/Copthorne Tara area which also comes up sometimes. By Islington, I am referring to the hotels that usually come up there on the betterbidding.com list.

I do not mind quiet at night so perhaps I should add The City on the P. zone.

Marriott Regents Park - like I say it's out of the way as it's by Swiss Cottage (miserable place)

Hilton Olympia - wouldn't exactly call it "western Kensington" which smacks more of Hammersmith to me. However the nearest Tube station with frequent trains is Kensington High Street which is about half a mile away.

I still say that of the areas you mention then City is by far the best.

Travelodge
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Though not 4 star if looking for great deals right in the heart of things try Travelodges - one Brit Fodorite recently reported actually scoring a 19 pound (or was it 29?) room at the Covent Garden Travelodge - and these are modern hotels. Anyway if not for you for others pondering cheap but decent London digs.

Premier Inns run sinimlar online limited in number discount schemes.

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Hi,

Because PL redrew their zones a couple of years ago there are some decent zones other that the usual suspects. Canary Wharf though - never :)

The PL # zones I'd feel comfortable bidding include

1 Bloomsbury/Marble Arch. Not my favorite because some of the hotels near Kings Cross. But any win would be central.

5 Kensington/Earls Court. Run the risk of getting the Olympia Hilton -- but that is a decent hotel.

7 Mayfair/Soho. A pricey zone and hard to get anything reasonable

10 City/London Bridge. Used to be a crappy zone but now w/the boundaries the worst you'd get is a nice hotel in a quiet City location.

12 Westminster. This used to be the best zone for location/price-- but now that it slides across the river into Vauxhall I generally avoid it.

Hope this helps

Hey, I just returned from a trip to London, where we stayed in Docklands. Everyone on this site pooh-poohed Docklands, but if you can put up with riding the DLR and then the tube or bus into the center for about 45 minutes each day, then you can get a nice hotel for under $100 on Priceline. We just stayed out late every night, pretty naturally, not on person. So we got to the hotel around midnight. DLR only runs until 12:30 am. Let me know if you want more information.

RaineyDay09: "<i>then you can get a nice hotel for under $100 on Priceline.</i>"

The thing is -- you can often get a hotel in one of the much more central zones listed above for under $100 too. I didn't mention anything when you posted about winning a place in Docklands for $100 -- since it was water under the bridge by that point. But my guess is you overbid just a bit.

thank you all. will try again and avoid the zones you have mentioned to avoid.. and add The city and see what happens!

£19 Travelodge deal is for one night stays only.

Let's be careful out there!

Steve_Ricks: you have to understand our PQ. He copy/pastes the identical info about those elusive £19 Travelodge and £29 Premier Inn deals on thread after thread. More than 11 times in just that last 18 months (I didn't search farther back). He can't help himself and we humour him ;)

and janisj I believe it is good information - do you not? There are lots of cheap rooms more than 19 pounds - yet another source of info to consider - I do find your negative attitude of posting an alternative to your pet London flats perplexing???

Travelodges and PremierInns are some of the best deals in London IMO so why diss them? What is your agenda?

Great info, will come in handy for my London trip later this year. Janisj, how far in advance do you recommend bidding?

cruiseluv: No magic time to bid. The advantage of bidding really early is you can start out low balling your offers and have plenty of time to adjust. You might luck out and catch a really cheap rate. But I've usually won my bids w/i a month or so of my stay.

One strategy is to book a place w/ a good cancellation policy (using sites like Londontown or through the hotel directly) and then you have a fall back position if Priceline doesn't work out. If you are successful on PL fine - if not you still have a place to stay.

Just FYI, the Hilton Olympia has been downgraded to a 3* according to www.betterbidding.com.

Janisj, at 4* would you also avoid Notting Hill/Bayswater? But Chelsea/Kensington should be OK, right?

Have had no luck up to $98, so am looking at a 3* Hotwire with breakfast with 90% approval rating.

Thanks, good idea.

"<i>Janisj, at 4* would you also avoid Notting Hill/Bayswater? But Chelsea/Kensington should be OK, right?</i>"

I avoid Notting Hill/Bayswater because most of the wins end up in Paddington/Queensway.

Chelsea isn't zoned w/ Kensington. It is lumped in w/ Knightsbridge. The problem w/ Chelsea is the zone includes the Chelsea Harbor area and there is no tube service and it is far from most sites. (Kensington is zoned w/ earls Court and includes South Kensington which is a pretty safe bidding zone no matter where you win)

Look at the actual PL zone map and you'll see the problem.

Kensington is zoned w/ earls Court and includes South Kensington which is a pretty safe bidding zone no matter where you win>

Well no some parts of Earls Court I would avoid at all costs - really tacky areas with lots of hostels drawing in a seedy IME crowd - that is in certain areas of Earls Court but not all ot it - but be careful about Earls Court in general IMO