london on the cheap
 

My husband has never been to London and I'd like to take hime over for along weekend. Where can we stay that is centrally located but not expensive. We are very simple and just need a clean bed and a shower. Also, some restaurant recommendations would be great.

I don't know if there is such a thing as reasonable cheap accomodation in London, but this placed was hyped up a year or so ago - same people who own the Easyjet airline.

http://www.easyhotel.com/

Search for Priceline on this forum and look at these two sites:
http://www.betterbidding.com
http://www.biddingfortravel.com

London and cheap are 2 words that cancel each other out.

I second Priceline. You can probably get a REAL hotel for less than the rates at the orange, glorified hostel that is the easyHotel.

PL is amazing for London.

They dont come cheaper http://www.hotels-london-hotel.com/h...tar/cheap.html

It is a problem. But there are several threads here if you do a search on cheap accomodations and London they should turn up - some of them are a year or so old, but some were very long with lots of sugesstions to try. I can recommend the Craven Gardens Hotel. They have a web site. A single in March of 05 was £39 including a full breakfast. Gareat location next to Hyde Park/Kensington Garden, and near two tube stations. I'll definitly stay there next time I'm in London. It was way better than any of the places I'd stayed previously.

Garden view hotel was about 60 us bucks and located in earls court

there are other hotels near there as well that were about 60 us dollars per night.

right across from earls court tube station there is a hostel for 40 us dollars per night.

What is your budget - what one calls cheap another would think expensive?

(I personally would MUCH rather stay in a 4 star place in the center of town for $65 or $75, than in cheap digs in Earls Court, Paddington, or other low cost neighborhoods.)

And don't worry - w/ a priceline hotel, all the free sites, and TKTS for theatre, you really CAN do London on the cheap.

But give us a $ or £ number to work w/

Uhm. Earls' court is not a bad area. Sorry to burst that bubble.

Let me post the pic from my hotel

<img src=http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g136/ilovetotravel29/73aa5ce8.jpg>

There are some nice properties w/i Earls Court - but also a LOT of dumps. Plus it is too far west to be convenient to many tourist attractions.

Earls Court isn't dangerous - but way down the list of attractive, convenient neighborhoods in London

We did London on the cheap, all of Europe, really. Here's where we stayed in London. http://www.alhambrahotel.com/index.html It's right across from the King's Cross tube station and a short walk to the British Library or British Museum. There was a fish and chips place around the corner, a neighborhood type of place w/ fair prices and good burgers as well. There was the chain Pizza Express down Euston Rd. and that was decent food at a fair price. Not more than you would pay here in the states. For lunch, we did the pasties at the train station shops. Like I said, we were on the cheap!

Ilovetotravel - could you give the name of the place you stayed. That's even better than we did. What did your room like like? What negatives did you encounter? I'm gathering info for our next trip, which I hope will be sooner rather than later.

JanisJ - I'd LOVE to have the info on the places that are more central and the price that you quoted!

Priceline, Priceline, Priceline!

It isn't great for a lot of cities, but for London PL works great. 4 star hotels near Marble Arch, Charing Cross and other really central areas regularly go for around $70 double.

>>Plus it is too far west to be convenient to many tourist attractions.<<

I agree with suggesting Priceline and some of your other assessments of Earl's Court but this is just crap. Earl's Court is one stop west of South Kens on three tube lines. Jeez.

Ilovetotravel, Please share the name of your hotel. The tourist ghettos (Earl's Court, Bayswater and often Bloomsbury) get trashed by some fodorite regulars. If you've got a first rate place to recommend, let's give good businesses more good business.

The name of the hotel was Garden View or Garden Court Hotel (I stayed in two separate hotels with Garden in the title!). I think it was Garden view hotel located two blocks from the earl's court tube.

I also stayed at the barkston gardens which was pricier, and while a bit bigger, did not have a good view and was super noisy (I could hear the people on the floor above me).

The Garden View Hotel had a great view, not noisy at all! they cleaned the room every day.

When you walk into the room in front is the closet, to the left was a door to my actual bedroom, to my right was the door to the very nice bathroom. No tub, but many hotels do not offer tubs anyway.

I really liked the place and would go back. Only thing I didn't like was that in the mornings during breakfast tons of teeny boppers were going crazy over the free bread and cereal. they were making toast like crazy and so loud I decided to just eat my food in my room.

:)

Ps---a Person can probably find a good deal at a posher hotel by using priceline. but I just did not like the fact not being sure I would get exactly the hotel I wanted, ya know?

I got the hotel by using hotels.com

I haven't figured out priceline enough to be savy. I have only seriously considered using it for airline tickets, but not hotels.

What <u>I</u> want to know is: what are these posh joints where I'm not wanted, and how do I get the internet discount?