Finding hotels in smaller towns??

[ufauxreal]

I've gotten some great deals, both on priceline and hotwire, in and around large cities. Now, we are wanting to book several days in Saratoga Springs, NY and I'm not sure how to proceed. I did a search on Hotwire, and they found NO hotels. I checked priceline, and they have 3* and 2* listed.(I haven't submitted any bid yet). I tried the usual.. Orbitz, Hotels.com but everything is coming up really expensive.. over $100/day. The dates we want are from 12/28-1/1. I realize we may need to pay a premium for the New Year's Eve nite. Also, on these searches they are including stuff in and around Albany, which is 20 miles away... we'd rather stay closer to Saratoga Springs.

Any suggestions? Any places to search (I also tried the hotel search on this site)?

Thanks!

JB :)

[Senoreit]

Well, perhaps I'm overlooking some things, but I don't really see where bidding for a small town is that much different than bidding for a big city, except that in your case there aren't any posted results for the city you're bidding so it's more of a mystery what hotel you may get (although it's possible to narrow down to some extent). The one major difference for a small-town bid is the lack of rebidding zones, but since your stay is a couple months away that isn't a huge factor.

As far as where to check out area hotels and prices, I think any of the standard sites (Orbitz, Expedia, Travelocity, etc.) are fine. I would venture to say that they will all display the hotels in Saratoga Springs that have any chance of participating in Priceline/Hotwire. As far as hotels coming up expensive ($100+) on those sites, that's what Priceline is for (so you can get a better deal), right? For any given participating hotel, you're certainly going to get a better deal on Priceline than anywhere else, and Priceline will give you a hotel within Saratoga Springs city limits.

I guess what I'm saying is that I'm not completely clear what the problem or issue here is. Are you hesitant to use Priceline for this stay? If so, why? Or is it just that you don't know how much to bid as a start?

[WillTravel]

Take a look at http://www.roomsaver.com .

[thereuare]

I would start with the left hand side of our SUPPORT PAGE.

[hannahb352]

I bid smaller towns quite often and I agree it can be a challenge. I have to keep trying several cities to find the right combination when bidding. I have noticed lately...in the area I often bid for example

Green Bay

DePere

Appleton

Neenah

Oshkosh

all in Wisconsin I get a different choice of cities depending on which one I enter first. And most recently I have noticed Priceline isn't including as many areas when i type in a city as it used to, making rebidding very difficult. I guess my advice is to try lots of smaller cities within say 30 miles of where you want to be. You may find that the area you want to stay in is grouped with other cities around it and then in turn offering you more rebid options. I'm not sure if this makes sense at all and maybe someone else can explain it better :) !!!

[thereuare]

I'll take a stab at it:

Zone 1:

City A

City B

Zone 2:

City A

City C

So the same city is listed in both zones.

Select Zone 1 and bid for City A, if rejected and no re-bids available, close that browser and Select Zone 2. You can then bid for City A <again> and utilize any re-bids available in that area as well.

Did i get it?

[hannahb352]

Can you really do it that way?? If you can I'm learning a new trick. I didn't know that if I opened up a new browser I could actually bid the city again just because it is listed in a new zone? I was thinking this as kind of in my example:

I enter Appleton WI- I'm offered Appleton, Neenah, DePere, and Oshkosh

I enter Neenah WI- I'm offered Neenah, Appleton, Oshkosh, FonDuLac

I enter DePere WI- I'm offered DePere, Appleton

I enter Oshkosh WI- I'm offered Oshkosh, Neenah, Appleton, Lomira, FonDuLac

For my purposes I wanted a specific 2.5* property in Neenah. To get a rebid I needed to use either Appleton which gave me DePere as a rebid or Oshkosh because Lomira is a rebid. IF I just used Neenah to start with I have no rebids for my 2.5* hotel I want.

So are you telling me that I could have tried my bids in the Appleton zone using Neenah and DePere and if no luck opened a new browser window and used Oshkosh zone and bid Neenah again with another bid and then Lomira as a rebid within 72 hours??

[thereuare]

I haven't tried it myself as i can't recall the last time i had an opportunity to do so (i can't remember the last time i stayed in a small town), but i think you can do it as i have stated above.

Please try it on your next bidding opportunity and let us know (i know the above works for the airfare product).

[dhammer53]

I posted bid results for Oshkosh WI. Just an FYI.

Back to the original posters question. You can also try Clifton Park. It's about 15 miles south of SS. You'll get mostly highway type of hotels for any PL/HW bid. Take a look at Expedia for a look/see at the various choices.

Lake George is 30 miles north of SS. Not much going on, but the lake is beautiful when it's covered with snow.

[aglinka]

Speaking of small cities, the town of Saint Johnsbury VT has both 2 and 1 star hotels listed.. I couldn't help but find such a small town on priceline funny. They don't even have a Burger King!

[headtrip]

I haven't been able to book any small town hotels yet. I was looking into a ski vacation, but the towns I have tried to book are either greyed out (like Mammoth Lakes) or the hotel prices weren't accepted at a reasonable level.

On my trip to Oregon last month, I got turned down for Bend, OR (serving Mt. Bachelor) for $40, but easily found a room with Jacuzzi (Quality Inn) for $59.00. (room w/o Jacuzzi would have been $52.)

The hardest part is because most small towns have limited rebids, and of course the hotels may be unknown as well, because most have not been used as often as the larger cities.