2* Staunton/Verona, Virginia Ramada under $50 on ramada.com

[LoneStar]

If, like me, you often find yourself heading to Central Virginia on a fall weekend for football, school visits or leaves, you know that finding an affordable place to stay (sometimes ANY place to stay) can be challenging. For obvious reasons, I've never had much luck with priceline/hotwire in such situations. I used to sometimes stay at the Harrisonburg Four Points using my Starwood points (it was a great deal at only 2000 points, no capacity controls), but that hotel has now left the Starwood system.

In looking around, I stumbled upon this book-direct deal on ramada.com. Depending on how many beds you want and other in-room amenities, the prices on the website currently range from $40 to $49 for fall bookings. I'm sure the property is no more than a servicable place to crash, although they do serve a free extended continental breakfast, get 3 stars from AAA and have a 4 star score on Trip Advisor (with the usual widely differing opinions!). There's no way you're otherwise going to get close to this price in that area for the busy fall season, so you might want to give them a try. No cancellation penalty, either.

BTW, before booking this, I called Marriott to enquire regarding their Courtyard, Fairfield Inn and Residence Inn properties in Central Virginia. All were completely sold out for several October weekends. So you might want to book early!

[LoneStar]

Hey thereuare --

If you want to stick this point here, please put "VA" in the title. Isn't Verona otherwise a place in Italy? :)

I stuck it in the "priceline VA" section because that's where I'd think to look if I was trying to buy a hotel room in central Virginia. Of course, I should probably look in "other hotel deals" too.

[LoneStar]

Must have been a pricing mistake (the deal seemed good, but wasn't so low as to be an obvious error). Ramada.com now says "dates for this property are not available on this system at this time."