The trip is for my grand-niece's graduation from Holy Names Academy. It's a pretty big deal. I will be staying at the maternal grandparents' house, which is right down the street from my nephew's house. I'll be in Seattle for the Baccalaureate Mass on Thursday and will stay for the commencement on Sunday. I'll leave on Monday morning, the 28th.

I really would rather stay in a motel or hotel--just because I'm such a loner. The Silver Cloud Inn is not far away. I've stayed there in the past, at a cost of under $150 per night. But Seattle has become incredibly expensive, so that the Silver Cloud is $284 per night--almost $1200 for 4 days. This is a nice hotel, but it's not what I'd call luxurious.

I'm going to Poland on June 1. I'll be staying at nice hotels, including the Hilton in Gdansk, which I really liked when I was there a couple of years ago. It costs a little less than $120 when you pre-pay.

There is a HI Hostel (former American hotel) within walking distance of the Amtrak King St. station. See if they have a private room available. You probably don't want a shared dorm room.

And she probably doesn't want to be that far away from Holy Names.

Moore Hotel is still in your budget. I think there may be a b&b suze mentions occasionally. And I’m wondering when you last stayed at Silvercloud because I bet it’s been a while since it it was $140 in June!

I agree, though, prices are insane. TA gets posters all the time who absolutely refuse to believe that what you see price wise is what you get.

on the bright side, pretty much anywhere I go, I look at hotel prices and think “oh not expensive at all!”

www.sbmansion.com is a lovely B&B just a few blocks from Holy Names. There are quite a few other B&Bs in this neighborhood, if that might work for you.

I live only a few blocks from there myself.

Thanks for your responses. Actually, the purpose of the post was just to whine about the cost of the Silver Cloud, in contrast to when we stayed there in years past, when it was reasonable. But that was probably 8 or 10 years ago.

My nephew and his family (and his inlaws) live in Laurelhurst, so that's where I'll be staying. I won't have a car, as my nephew and various others talked me out of driving over because of the traffic. I'm flying over, and they will pick me up at the airport and we'll go directly to the Baccalaureate at St.James.

I'm a little apprehensive about this, as I will be limited to some extent by the plans the family makes. That's okay, I guess. I can just settle down somewhere with my kindle and read.

I'm very fond of my grand-niece. She's always been a character. When she was pre-toddler, I don't think she ever crawled on her hands and knees. She just scooted around on her little butt. She used to make this terrible growling sound--for no reason that I could figure out. She sounded like a demon from Hades.

As soon as the cruise ships start turning up the hotels all adjust their rates to see how painful they can make it and still fill the beds. It's downright crazy; there are weekends in the summer when a mediocre hotel room in Seattle costs more than one in midtown Manhattan or the West End in London. And it's not that much better the rest of the year, with business tripping Amazonians, conference-goers and other jetset riffraff disrupting our little corner of hell paradise.

Oh, OK. Glad you're all set. I was going to offer you my guest room, except I'm headed off to PV next week! And yes Seattle hotels cost more than they did 10 years ago Hope you have a nice reunion with your family here.