Well I have to say that I am very pleased with the standard of the Stamford Plaza Sydney Airport Hotel and thoroughly recommend this hotel when you have a stop over in Sydney.

It is simply minutes from the airport and there is a shuttle provided to and from both the domestic and international terminals for $6.00 per person.

I booked this hotel through HotelClub.com and it was self rated at 5 stars. I would say it is probably in keeping with a 4 star hotel.

The check in service is quick and the staff friendly and efficient.

The room is large, with a comfortable king sized bed, tv, tv cabinet, writing desk and chair,  comfortable armchair and pouffe, lots of mirrors in the room and bathroom, plenty of hanging space, ironing board and iron, reasonably sized safe and hairdryer.  Broadband internet is available although I cannot tell you how much it would cost as I didn’t have to use  it as I am using a prepaid wireless USB device which connects almost anywhere.

One thing I did notice was that it was missing a clock radio so I had to turn on my o2 pocket pc to check the time. I can’t remember having stayed in a hotel without a clock before.

We went down to a buffet breakfast which is available from 6:00am to 10.00am. The early morning breakfast is ideal for those who have an early flight. Our breakfast cost $17.00 per person which I consider to be very reasonable for a buffet breakfast…at least for Australia.

The breakfast room has a nice ambiance and the waiting staff are efficient and unobtrusive. The chefs are very helpful if you have special requests or requirements. We  don’t have any special needs but there were some people who were asking for special dietary items which the chef was more than happy to oblige with.

On offer were boiled eggs, scrambled eggs, thinly sliced bacon, grilled tomatoes, hash browns, an assortment of cereals, bread and toppings – Vegemite, honey, jam, pancakes, juices- orange, apple and pineapple, yogurt, an assortment of teas and coffee and fresh fruit.  Everything was plentiful and very tasty.

King sized bed with comfortable pillows

Comfortable Arm Chair and Pouffe

Bedroom – Stamford Plaza Sydney Airport

Tv Cabinet Stamford Plaza Sydney Airport

Bathroom

Our Rating of the Stamford Plaza Hotel Sydney Airport:

Checking in and out 5/5
Room 4/5
Position 5/5
Price 5/5 (Based on our HotelClub deal)
Cleanliness 4/5

After our stay at the Holiday Inn Express,Metrotown Burnaby for the Stargate convention we moved to downtown Vancouver for a couple of days. Since we have had great stays at all of the Holiday Inns we have stayed in so far, we decided to stay at the Holiday Inn & Suites, Vancouver Downtown, at 1110 Howe St.

The cost for the 2 days was $104 for the first night and $137 for the second. We booked it a couple of days before we intended to leave Burnaby.

Trying to save on yet another taxi fare, we decide to catch the Skytrain from Burnaby to downtown Vancouver. Fortunately, the Skytrain leaves from right outside our hotel but we also have our luggage with us and we have to consider whether there will be a heap of stairs to contend with. We decide to take the risk and check out of our Burnaby hotel and head to the 2nd floor which has direct access to the Skytrain.

We find one set of stairs before we even get to the Skytrain station but we manage and head through the overpass to get to the ticket machines. It will be 2 zones to get us to downtown Vancouver so it will cost us $3.75 each.

We head to the station and since the signs are well posted we are easily able to determine which side of the platform to catch the train from.

The trains arrive every few minutes so we don’t have to wait long before we are on our way.

We had checked Google Maps the day before and found that Granville station was the closest stop to the Holiday Inn Downtown Vancouver. The trip takes about 15 minutes and once on arrival we drag our luggage off the train and start the trek to our hotel.

Of course the directions from Google Maps are no real help since we get out of the station at a totally different exit and we are already disorientated. After going into a store to ask someone for directions to Howe St ,we are once again on our way.

Unfortunately, it is raining and cold and after walking close to a mile with our luggage we arrive at the hotel feeling a little sad and sorry for ourselves. Fortunately, however, we are given a room straight away, even though we are a little early for check-in. The young lady behind the counter is friendly and helpful and provides us with a map of Vancouver.

As we are Priority Club members we are given a few extra benefits including designated parking closest to the main entrance, complimentary appetizers in Medleys Lounge (on the lobby level) between 4-6pm on weekdays, a daily newspaper delivered to our door and complimentary local phone calls.

It is well worth becoming a Priority Club member. It’s free and you can rack up points to use for free accommodation.

We head up to our room on the 5th floor (#529). The lift is not very big and with us and our luggage it is just about full.

Our room is not particularly close to the lift but we do pass another lift before we get to our room. We do end up trying this lift at another time but find it is just as easy to walk the extra distance to use the main lift.

The room looks like a typical Holiday Inn room. This is a good thing as so far we have loved our time at each of the Holiday Inns we have stayed at.

The room is a double with two double beds that are very comfortable. Both have clean fresh linen and a padded mattress. There are four pillows on each bed. Two are labelled ‘soft’ and the other two ‘firm’.

In the room is a tv cabinet with a 26in tv, a desk and chair, a padded lounging chair with foot rest and a mini-bar fridge hidden in a wood cabinet. On top of the cabinet is a 4 cup coffee maker with coffee and tea bags. There is also a bottle of water but at a cost of $3.50 per bottle, we decide to give this a miss.

The mini-bar is sealed but has a key to open it. Since the contents of most hotel mini-bars is way overpriced we don’t bother opening it.

Next to the lounging chair is a small table with an ice bucket and 3 glasses. We later find the ice machine near the lift. There is also a Coke machine with drinks at $1.25 each. This seems really cheap to us but when we have lunch the next day at a Food Court we buy a bottle of water and a can of Coke for $1.05 each. Not sure why Vancouver has such cheap drinks but we aren’t complaining.

The bathroom is relatively small with only a bathtub with shower and a toilet. The sink is separate from the bathroom, which I personally don’t like but we have seen this sort of set up in a number of hotels we have stayed at. The bathroom has a lockable door but the sink area is open.

In the alcove where the sink is situated is a hair dryer, a kettle for boiling water, an ironing board and iron and open hanging space. There is also a metal folding luggage rack.

Lighting in the room is okay – we are yet to find a hotel room with really good lighting. The bathroom, entryway and sink area have ceiling lighting while the rest of the room is lit by lamps.

Noise wasn’t too much of a problem. Street noise wasn’t too bad and we couldn’t hear people in the rooms on either side of us. The main noise came from doors shutting and people talking as they walked past the rooms. When other guests closed their doors they would often bang loudly and reverberate through the room.

This Holiday Inn provides free wireless internet. We were hoping for wired internet as it is much more stable. We didn’t have a problem connecting initially. It was just a matter of opening up a browser window and the Holiday Inn connection page opened up. We needed a code to get access and had to ring the front desk for this as it wasn’t anywhere to be seen in the room. We found the connection wasn’t good at all – it was slow and would constantly drop out.

This hotel has a coin operated laundry on level CD which must be accessed with a room key. There are 2 washing machines in the room and 2 dryers. We went to the front desk for change and they were happy to provide it. Both the washer  and the dryer cost $1.50 each to use and soap powder is also available for 75c per load. We found that the dryer didn’t dry our clothes enough so we had to put in another $1.50.

We found the room to be clean and well maintained. Housekeepking did a thorough job of cleaning the room each day.

One thing we don’t like is the lack of safe in the room. We carry a laptop with us so we like to lock this up when we leave the room. Leaving it with the front desk to lock up in the hotel safe is possible but not very convenient.

The view isn’t terribly spectacular. Just a city street and plenty of buildings. There is a small balcony but it was too cold for us to be out there.

The hotel is in a convenient position but it isn’t right in the city centre. It took us about 15 minutes to walk from the main shopping street back to our hotel however, it was an easy walk. We are just around the corner from the entertainment area which includes a large number of adults only shops.

There are plenty of places to eat near the hotel. We ate across the road for breakfast one morning and for dinner we ate in the hotel restaurant downstairs. The food was absolutely delicious and reasonably priced.

We took advantage of the hop-on, hop-off bus which has a stop across the road from the hotel. It cost us $35 for two days. This takes you to the main sites around Vancouver and you can get on and off at the various stops on the way. It was a shame that it was too cold and wet for us to get off the bus to look around.

Breakfast is provided by the Best Western Hotel so we were up early to make the most of this before heading out to take a look around. The Best Western Lamplighter Inn & Suites is in a good position if you have a car, which of course we don’t. So if you are like us and are relying on public transport, here are some instructions to help you get around.

There are buses and the MT Trolley which will get you to all the main attractions, there is also a hop on, hop off sightseeing bus and the Old Town Trolley Tour – not to be confused with the MT Trolley system.

We decided to start with the MT Trolley which meant leaving our hotel and turning right into El Cajon Blvd. Walk up past the Howard Johnson Hotel and the Fitness centre and turn right into College Ave and walk to until you come to the San Diego State University (SDSU) which will be straight ahead.  The walk is 1.5 miles from the hotel to SDSU and it is a nice easy walk. When you get to the Transit Centre go down the escalator or stairs and purchase your ticket from one of the vending machines.  We intend to be out and about so we brought a 4 day pass for $15 each. Go through the doors to the left of the vending machines and go downstairs to the platform.

The trolley’s run every 15 minutes and it’s not too long before ours arrives. The transit center and the trolley are extremely clean and there is no graffiti anywhere. It is such a nice change to find a place where the people take pride in public property.

Another thing I noticed is that when an elderly or infirm person hops on the trolley, the young people stand up and offer their seat straight away. None of this ignoring them or looking the other way as is often seen in other centers.

We are on the Green Line trolley which takes us to Old Town.

The Plaza del Pasado or Old Town in San Diego is a historic town that captures the festive spirit of Mexico and where some of the old buildings have been turned into restaurants and shops and others such as the old courthouse and the dentist rooms are preserved so todays youth can see how things were in the past.

It is a beautiful day to spend time strolling around the shops and outdoor markets and we take our time enjoying the exotic aromas and colorful decor of the plaza. Old Town is considered to be the birthplace of California and in 1769 it became the first permanent Spanish settlement in California.

In 1846 the population numbered 250 and had grown somewhat and it was incorporated as a city in 1850 with the government activities centred around the Plaza Viejo.  After the business district of Old San Diego was burned down in 1872, the business centre moved to the present day site of Downtown San Diego.

Some of historic buildings still standing are the Casa De Machado which was built in the adobe style of construction by Corporal Jose Manuel Machado for his daughter Maria Antonia Machado de Silvas, The Temple Beth Israel which was the first synagogue built in San Diego in 1889. Most of the other buildings are recontructions such as the Brick Courthouse and the George Johnson House. But all are worthy of a visit.

Then it is off to catch the Blue Line Trolley, which leaves from where the Green Line ends, and head off into the Civic Centre in Downtown San Diego.

By now it is lunchtime and we head over to Anthony’s Seafood Grotto which is right on the water of San Diego Bay. The food is absolutely delicious and our waitress is friendly and chatty. Once again our accents cause comment, most seem to think we are English and are pleasantly surprised when we state we are Aussies. This generally leads to conversations about how long it took us to get to the US, where we have been and how long we will be in town.

After lunch we head off down to the USS Midway Museum which has a 4 acre flight deck and gives visitors the opportunity to explore the ship with the aid of an audio presentation.  The tickets are $15.00 and the ticket office suggest making sure you have 1.5 to 3 hours to complete the tour.  We decide that we will return another day and do this tour.

By now we have picked up a number of maps and public transport timetables and routes and it turns out that we have a bus that stops right outside our hotel which will take us to the trolley transit station.  Before we discover this piece of information we decide to hop of at another stop, other than the SDSU to see if it is closer to our hotel.  So we hop off at the 70th Street stop, and turn right from the carriage and set off in what we hope is the right direction. The No.1 bus (which runs past our hotel) goes by, so we figure if go in the same direction we will at least be heading the right way.

We turn left into 70th Street and walk up a rather steep hill until we reach El Cajon Blvd.  Here we turn left and continue. It is simply a matter of walking along El Cajon Blvd. We are at number 6900 when we turn onto the Blvd from 70th Street and our hotel is numbe 6474 so we have a way to go.  We pop into Ralph’s on the way and pick up some groceries and a Ralph Card that gives us some excellent discounts on our items.  I am a sucker for saving money and will join just about anything if it gives me a bargain.

Our feet are getting tired – thank goodness we brought good quality ARA walking shoes before our trip because we have walked many miles since we arrived in the States, and we are very happy when the hotel looms into sight.

After a nice hot cup of tea we head out to do some washing at the laundromat which is almost next door to the hotel. Turn left as you leave the hotel reception area and walk  just past the Chicken Rotissere store where there is a block of shops with the laundromat.  After putting the washing into the washer we go back to the hotel to watch some more Stargate episodes. Our hotel has more stations than any other we have stayed in so far and one is a sci fi station so this makes us very happy.

Paula also spends time on the phone to the internet company as we have been unable to connect to our hotel’s internet, which is included in the price of the room. It turns out that we have to update the drivers in our Acer notebook before it will connect to the right service. 

Once the washing and drying has completed and we once again have nice clean clothes, we set off for dinner.  We had intended to  eat at the buffet at the Howard Johnson hotel that is just up the road, but it is closed when we get there.  We continue up the road and come to a Mexican restaurant.  The food turns out to be awesome and of course way more than we can eat.

Tomorrow we are going to head off to Tijuana on the blue line trolley.

While we were in San Francisco we decided to stay at Holiday Inn Express Hotel & Suites San Francisco Fishermans Wharf (This hotel is not to be confused with the Holiday Inn Hotel – Fisherman’s Wharf which is right next door.)

We actually got a great deal through Hotwire which included return airfares from Las Vegas and 5 nights accommodation for $376 each. This is the first time we have booked through Hotwire and the process was quite simple. The only drawback is that you don’t know your flight times until after you have booked and paid for the package. So after booking we found that the outbound flight was leaving Las Vegas at 7am (which meant we had to be up at 4.30am) and our return flight was leaving at 9pm. Not the best times but then it was worth it for the cheap deal.

We got a door-to-door shuttle to our hotel from the airport which cost $16 each and it took about 30 minutes or so to get to our hotel.

When we got to the front desk we found only one person behind the counter so we had to wait a few minutes to be attended to. The girl at the reception desk was very competent and quick and even though it was only 9.30am and well before check-in time we were given a room. This may have had something to do with the fact that we are Priority Club members. However, during our entire stay we found that the staff at the front desk were very helpful and friendly to everyone who approached the reception area.  This same friendly manner and professionalism was also displayed by the staff at the Holiday Inn in Tusayan when we visited the Grand Canyon recently.

On the way to the lift to get to our room we notice the clean, modern lobby area and the eating area where people are still eating breakfast. The hotel has a nice feel about it and appears to be well maintained from what we can see at a first glance.

When we get to our room we are pleased with what we see. Our room is big enough to accommodate two people comfortably and looks clean and fresh.

Our room is a double room on the 2nd floor (#268) with two double beds, a TV cabinet with a 26in(68cm) TV and a table with two lounging chairs.

Next to one of the beds is a closet with hanging space. It also contains an iron and ironing board and a fold up luggage rack. There is also a safe in the closet which is large enough to hold our 14in laptop. The safe uses a key rather than the digital keypad password that you see in most hotel room safes these days.

There is adequate storage with closet hanging space and the three drawers in the bottom of the TV cabinet.

Lighting is fairly good. There are ceiling lights in the entrance way but the rest of the room is lit by lamps – one between the two beds and a standard lamp next to the table.

The beds are very comfortable with padded mattresses and clean fresh linen. Each bed has four pillows with each pillow slip embroidered with either the word ‘soft’ or ‘firm’.

The view from our room is not what I would call a view. We can see what you might call a courtyard and we look across to another room. Subsequently we keep the net curtains closed for our entire stay.

The bathroom is not huge but it is bright and clean and actually looks like it has been recently renovated. There is one sink, a toilet and a bathtub with shower.

The water pressure from the shower is okay. It’s not really strong but it’s pretty good. The showerhead also allows you to adjust the flow to suit your preferred spray type.

The towels are plentiful and are soft and clean.

The bathroom also has a 2 cup coffee maker and the hotel provides both tea and coffee. This is something we really missed when we stayed at Caesar’s Palace and The Golden Nugget in Las Vegas. After there is nothing quite like sitting down with a nice hot cup of tea after a day of sightseeing.

The air conditioner in the room does the job although it was a little noisy. While it was on we had to turn the TV up in order to hear the programs.

Just near the lifts on our floor is a room with an ice machine and a vending machine which sells drinks. To get into the room we needed to use our hotel key.

As we need access to the internet in order to run our business we love staying at Holiday Inn hotels as the internet is free – at least it has been in the ones we have stayed in so far. The connection is wired. To connect just open your browser and it will connect to a screen where you just need to click on a link and then you will get immediate access to the internet.

While we were here we took advantage of the coin operated laundry in the next building which is also part of Holiday Inn. To get to it, exit at the front of the hotel and turn right. Keep walking and cross over the first road you see which will get you to the other Holiday Inn. Walk through the lobby until you see the lifts and take the lift to the “G” (garage) floor. This will take you to the parking garage. Walk straight ahead and turn to the left and you should see a room against the wall which will be the laundry. Make sure you have plenty of quarters. The laundry powder was $1.50, the washing machine was $2.00 and the dryer was $2.00.

This hotel is located in an ideal position. It took us around five minutes to walk to Fisherman’s Wharf, around 10-15 minutes (uphill) to walk to The Crookedest Street and about 5 minutes to get to the pick up point for the hop-on/hop-off bus.

There are also plenty of restaurants and cafes close by. Denny’s is actually in the building itself and there is a bar and grill across the road but there are plenty of other restaurants and cafes within easy walking distance.

Overall we really enjoyed our stay here and would definitely come back again.

Our Rating of the Holiday Inn Express Hotel & Suites San Francisco Fishermans Wharf :

Checking in and out 5/5
Room 4/5
Position 4.5/5
Price 5/5 (Based on our Hotwire package deal)
Cleanliness 4/5

We booked this excellent package through Hotwire, where you will also find great deals.