Archive for the 'East Coast' Category
NYC Restaurant Week 2010: Three-course dinner for $35
November 18, 2009 12:32pm
Time your New York City vacation right and you may be able to eat your way through the Big Apple without going broke. This week, the dates for the famous NYC Restaurant Week Winter 2010 were announced by NYC & Company, the city’s marketing and tourism organization.
The two-week event, which runs semiannually in summer and winter, is scheduled for Jan. 25 to Feb. 7, 2010.
And maybe we have the recession to thank, but prices for the foodie series are the same as they were in 2006. At participating restaurants, three-course, prix-fixe dinners will run $35. Lunches will cost $24.07 (as in 24 hours a day/7 days a week in the city that doesn’t sleep). These prices do not include beverages, tax and tip. And the special prices are valid every day during the two-week period except Saturdays. Read the rest of this entry »
New York City: Free Wi-Fi in Times Square
November 10, 2009 10:06am
This is the week to spread free Wi-Fi love. Following the news that Google is bringing free Wi-Fi to dozens of airports this holiday season, travelers can also find free Wi-Fi in New York City’s Times Square. Yahoo and the Times Square Alliance partnered to make Wi-Fi accessible in the Pedestrian Plaza where the TKTS discount ticket booth is located (pictured above, with visitors on top).
The service kicked off Tuesday morning with a free cup of coffee at the Times Square Internet Cafe on the Broadway Pedestrian Plaza between 43rd and 44th streets, just east of Military Island, where patrons will be able to sit down in the Internet café.
While locals and travelers alike will use the Wi-Fi to check their e-mail, there are countless ways for travelers to access New York travel information online too. You can look for and book Broadway theater tickets, download a New York City iPhone app or look up a New York City restaurant review on Yelp.
What will you use the Times Square free Wi-Fi for?
—Jen Leo, Los Angeles Times Travel & Deal blogger
Photos: Top: Times Square visitors sit atop the TKTS booth on July 28, 2009. Credit: Andrew Harrer / Bloomberg News; Bottom: Times Square Free Wi-Fi kickoff event. Credit: Yahoo
Vermont: Tame that tension with $999 in spa treatments at Equinox Resort
November 8, 2009 9:00am
If you believe there’s no such thing as too much time in a spa, then this New England special might be just your cup of chamomile tea. Equinox Resort in Manchester Village, Vermont, is offering a “Cloud 999” package that will have you steeping in relaxation at its full-service spa.
But, as with all deals out there, don’t forget to calculate closely to make sure you see the offer for what it really is.
Deal or no deal? Valid for three-night stays, the $999 package, pretax, includes your accommodations (in a king or two-queen “superior” room) and $999 worth of spa treatments.
At face value, that sounds like a free room, right? But that’s not really the case, because you can get a comparable room under another resort special (an advance-purchase offer), without the spa credit, for as low as $139 per night, or $417 for the three nights. So what the deal amounts to, essentially, is $417 in spa savings. Read the rest of this entry »
New York City in winter: Hotel bargains, post-holiday ice rink and freebies
November 6, 2009 5:58am
Cold it may be come December and January, but in New York City this winter, you might find comfort in the plentiful hotel deals on offer. And as always, attractions in the Big Apple can be found for cheap, or free, for the resourceful traveler.
Hotels
At the Pod Hotel, on East 51st Street at 3rd Avenue, the cheapest accommodation is a single pod room. You may have to share a bathroom with strangers, but you get stylish digs with a twin bed, workspace, WiFi, iPod docking station and LCD TV. I found one of these in January for just $79 per night (pre-tax). If your party consists of more than you, a bunk-bed pod room (pictured above) can be had for $89 — also a shared-bath situation. Double and queen rooms, with private bath, are $119 and $139, respectively.
The W New York, in Midtown, is having a sale, though you have to book this one by Nov. 10: Read the rest of this entry »
For a sane holiday, consider Hotels.com’s Thanksgiving sale
October 31, 2009 6:51pm
If bunking up with Cousin Lenny sounds like the worst way to spend your Thanksgiving holiday away, why not treat yourself to your own peaceful quarters this year? Booking a room close to (but not with) the family doesn’t have to break the bank, thanks in part to promotions like Hotels.com’s Thanksgiving sale. Through it, you can find a range of properties for up to 30% off in 100 cities.
One of those is Denver, where 30%-off rooms at the Burnsley All-Suite Hotel are attainable. In Orlando, Fla. — where, it must be said, accommodations bargains are never rare — you can get a room for $41 per night, pretax, at the Seralago Hotel, a few miles from Disney World. Up in New York, stay for 20% off at the Time Hotel, close to Broadway shows; rates here around Thanksgiving start at $183 per night (the usual average is $229).
But there are lots of options closer to home too, for instance:
Palm Springs
I stopped into Riviera Resort & Spa’s reservation system for a stay Wednesday through Friday of that week, and got a total of about $600, after taxes and fees, for the two nights. The total price I found via Hotels.com was $478. Read the rest of this entry »
GEM Hotel offers Manhattan rooms from $139 during the holidays
October 26, 2009 5:58am
If you’re heading to New York City for business, pleasure or some shopping during the holiday season, you might not be holding your breath for bargain-basement deals at the city’s hotels.
Or maybe you’re already wise to the fact that the hard economic times have bitten into even Big Apple tourism, leading to some head-turning deals. For instance, the budget GEM Hotel brand, generally rated positively among travelers for good value, is offering the following rates at its centrally located properties.
Deal: The “Cool Yule” special offers rooms starting at $139 per night, pretax, at the three GEM Hotel locations in Manhattan during these dates: Nov. 20-29 and Dec. 13-29. This represents a savings of about $80 per night, since regular rates during these dates hover around $219. Read the rest of this entry »
California’s Great America to add swing ride, re-theme kids area for 2010
October 23, 2009 5:55am
California’s Great America officials expect the Screamin’ Swing ride at Knott’s Berry Farm to be relocated to the Santa Clara theme park by summer 2010.
Knott’s is removing the pneumatically powered pendulum swing ride to make room for Demon Drop, a 26-year-old thrill ride being removed from Cedar Point and relocated to the Buena Park theme park.
Confused?
Priceline gives weekly updates on Thanksgiving and Christmas air travel
October 21, 2009 9:59am
If you are still waiting for a good deal to book your holiday travel, we suggest you tune into Priceline’s travel blog. Brian Ek is giving a weekly update on flight costs for travel around Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Earlier this month we talked with Ek about holiday airfare prices and concluded that if you had to pick between traveling during one of the holidays, Thanksgiving was going to be cheaper. However, in this week’s analysis, prices are going up for Thanksgiving and coming down slightly during Christmas.
“At the macro level, Thanksgiving airfares increased to an average $372, while December holiday airfares dropped to an average $423. Thanksgiving is still the better deal, but Christmas is looking better,” Ek writes.
These averages are based on flights booked by Priceline customers. So, what does it mean for SoCal travelers?
Ek said that airfares between Los Angeles and Chicago were down 9% for winter travel and up 20% for Thanksgiving. However, fares between Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., were down 8% for Thanksgiving travel and unchanged for winter travel.
For more end-of-the-year travel booking advice, read “Holiday travel planning tips from the experts.”
—Jen Leo, Los Angeles Times Travel & Deal blogger
Image: Priceline logo. Credit: Priceline.com
Dodgers fans: Start your engines in Philadelphia
October 19, 2009 5:58am
If the Dodgers-Phillies series doesn’t get your heart racing, the Simeone Foundaton Museum in Philadelphia just might.
Dodgers fans visiting the city of Brotherly Love for the NLCS baseball playoffs may want to take in the museum, which contains 60 meticulously restored racing cars, including a 1909 American Underslung, a 1916 Stutz Bearcat, a 1964 Cobra Daytona Coupe and a 2002 NASCAR Dyno Mule, among other works of art.
Even if you’re not a big auto racing fan, these models of form and function are something amazing to behold as studies in engineering and artistry. The opening page of the museum says, “The first race was conceived when the second car was built.” When you look at some of the pre-World War I cars, you may be as startled as I when you realize how closely competition came on the heels of the manufacture of the first car.
Dodgers fans: For food, follow the stars in Philly
October 17, 2009 10:04am
Now that the Dodgers will be in Philadelphia at least until Wednesday (thank you, men in blue), Dodgers fans may be headed back to the City of Brotherly Love. And that means only one thing: cheese steaks.
OK, not really. And not anymore. Philly’s come up in the food world, which means the Dodgers and the Phillies aren’t the only game in town.
During the filming of an a James L. Brooks comedy (reportedly called “How Do You Know?”), some of the glitterati have been frequenting the best of Philly. Starring in the love-triangle flick and in the city the last few months: Owen Wilson, Jack Nicholson, Paul Rudd and Reese Witherspoon. Not known (to me anyway) whether they’ve tried Pat’s King of Steaks (although Barack Obama ate there in April 2008 when he was a presidential candidate) and Geno’s Steaks, the best-known cheese steak places in town, but we do know where the elite have deigned to eat. So take a tip, Dodgers fans, if you’re back there, and keep fingers crossed that any meals might be celebratory dinners.
Philadelphia Inquirier Inqlings columnist Michael Klein says Witherspoon has been seen at Jones at 7th and Chestnut streets (American, modestly priced), and Alma de Cuba (Latin American/Caribbean/Cuban) and POD (pan-Asian/Pacific Rim), and Wilson is said to have dined regularly at Parc at Rittenhouse Square (French). Nicholson, meanwhile, dined at 10 Arts at the Ritz-Carlton (regional American) , said Howard Gensler in the Philadelphia Daily News.
But, really, fans, can anything beat the taste of a Dodger dog?
— Catharine Hamm, Times Travel editor
Photo: Juan Pierre, left, Andre Ethier and Matt Kemp do the chest bump to celebrate the Dodgers’ 2-1 win over the Phillies on Friday at Dodger Stadium. Credit: Alex Gallardo / Los Angeles Times
