Priceline Hotel: 4* Budapest Marriott

[nyctraveler]

Congratulations, you got your price of $70 for a 4-star hotel room.

Your Offer Price: $70.00

Number of Rooms: 1

Number of Nights: 3

Subtotal: $210.00

Taxes & Service Fees: $41.87

Total Charges: $251.87

I've bid several times to get a 5*, and as my trip is not until March I've tried to low-ball it with $70, $80 for a 5*, never got it right, and also went low with rebid for 4* $60, $65, no luck. Tonight tried with a $80 5* bid, got rejected, retried by adding 4* with $70 and the offer was accepted.

I probably could have played more and gotten a lower rate, but I am taking an around-the-world trip using the One World Alliance Jan 5 - April 14 2005 and have a lot more planning (hotel-wise) to do, so I don't have the luxury of time to keep playing since I want to set my hotel plans in stone by end of 2004. Not to say I'm not happy with $70 for the hotel I wanted. I will post my other bids and successes with other hotels.

Working on Warsaw, Amsterdam, Venice currently any pricing strategies would be helpful, prefer to get 5* in Warsaw not sure right pricing level. Not sure if I will use Priceline for London or not. Not bidding every city since I'm using Starwood points to pay for hotel rooms in a lot of cities.

[thereuare]

Sounds like a fantastic adventure you have planned.

Although you're certainly traveling in a different style than a friend of mine, it reminded me of an email she sent my wife and i while she was on her journey thru some third world countries, of which i provide an excerpt below:

The buses are so crazy here. Not the city buses, but the ones that take you from town to town. We were in Essaouria for a few days and had to take the bus back to Marrakesh which is about a 3.5 hour drive, passing through all these little towns. The bus is like a greyhound bus in a way, but much older and more rickety. They store the luggage on top of the bus under these big green nets. There are some windows on the bus, but the Moroccans never want them open. I can

[nyctraveler]

What a story - Some of these off-the-beaten path stories are absolutely HYSTERICAL! I think I may have a similar experience going to Turkey and visiting a friend of mine who lives in Selcuk, an hour flight, or multi-hour train ride from Istanbul - we'll see...

Well with the help of this board and any success at Priceline I may have a good set of lodging choices at least. 90 days to pay for hotels ugh... But I'm not complaining it will be well worth it! I'll post future activity with hotels.

Thanks thereuare. p.s. congrats on the new addition to your family! i caught some of those posts the other day.