The Au Chateau newsletter that I have just received has 3 of their places with equal exchange rates...one in the Dordogne, one in the Tarn and one in Normandy. Here is the newsletter for anyone interested...probably need to reserve EARLY. as I am sure they will go quickly!!
au Château News - May / June 2005

What I entered previously was not helpfu...here you go:

http://www.au-chateau.com/auChateauNews25.htm

Very useful information--thanks. American tourism must be dropping! Let's hope the $/€ eqivalency will catch on in other places.

Wouldn't it be great if they did that in London?!

d'Aubusson hotel did this over the winter....

Kind of curious how this works. Do you pay in dollars ? And then can europeans (or any non-americans, for that matter) also pay in dollars and get the 30% discount ?

-Kevin

It appears that the reservation must be made today -- am I not correct that the offer requires "booking by April 30"? And France is 6 hours ahead of central Canada and the eastern US!!

Hi gracejoan, I cannot seem to pull up this web site, what search engine did you use, is the address correct? I'd like to check out the Normandy one ASAP. Thanks, yy4me

just click on this and you should have it...copy the complete url..enter it and voila..............

http://www.au-chateau.com/auChateauNews25.htm

Kevin...don't understand your question..re Europeans paying dollars etc...if the cost is 165 euros, they are charging Americans 165 in dollars, rather than the converted 210 approx. in dollars...Europeans pay in euros 165..don't know why they would want to convert and pay in dollars???

Re search engine that I used...none..I subscribe to the Au Chateau newsletter. The posted info was in it when I received their e-mail newsletter. You can subscribe to it..it is free, and informative.

Europeans might want to pay 165 US$ because that comes to a lot less than 165 Euros! Why else?

I'm european and usually have a reasonable amount of dollar cash and would certainly try and book this deal if I were intending to stay here...

This is something being done to attract more Americans to travel, in equalizing the dollar and the euro. I don't think it is meant to be used in ANY other way. If you have excess dollar funds and are a European, I think I would ask IF you could use them for this promotion, which is obviously geared towards the Americans.

After 9/11 when Americans did not travel very much, many European hotels offered the same deal to get them to come back.

The way it worked before and I'm thinking it's the same here, you have to have a CC with US based address, so no, you can't just walk in and pay with US$ cash.

I should have said British hotels, not European as that would not make any sense at that time.

Would always ask but would also be surprised if a hotel refused to allow a European to use the offer as it would be so discriminatory, regardless of intent. Don't know legal position though...

I'm still working on the "30% discount" mentioned above. If you pay $1 instead of 1.29 or 1.30 dollars (per euro) I figure that's about a 23% discount -- not 30%. That's still a great savings, but many hotels do 20% or 25% discounts of all sorts. Just the other day someone here mentioned LeRegent Hotel in Paris was offering a 25% summer discount. That's actually stightly better than this dollar per euro deal. But I suppose the "gimmick" of the idea really attracts a lot of people.

And we did a hotel in London about 10 years ago where it was in dollars at the usual pound rates (then it was about $1.55 to the pound if memory serves), so that was a great deal.

I'm the one who mentioned Le Regent's summer discount. But it's 20% and not 25%. Btw, Luxembourg Parc is offering a 25% summer rate discount. If anyone likes the Relais Saint Jacques which looks very nice (staff seem very thoughtful too via emails). They have a nice summer rate discount. For example, a prestige room (18 sq. m.) with buffet breakfast is 140 euro. It's pretty good for Paris.

Ooops, sorry Francophile, 25% stuck in my mind.

I especially like some of those deals you see in Conde Nast and Travel and Leisure -- "stay four nights in a 650 euro room and get a fifth night free". That's also a 20% discount -- but at what total cost?

<b>Kavey</b>,

There is nothing discrimitory about this. It's a targeted offer for a certain group of customers. It's no different than having a &quot;special&quot; rate for corporate or government employees or senior citizens or AAA members or??? Hotels do that all the time.

While it's possible that guests outside the targeted group slip through the cracks on occasion and get the special rate, in most cases you have to prove that you deserve that rate, and in this case it means a US based credit card. At least that's how it worked with the UK hotels few years ago. I stayed with Thistle Hotels about 3-4 times back then as the 1BP-$1US deal was hard to beat. The reservation had to be booked and PAID with a US based CC.

'spose so...

Interesting....