Archive for the 'San Diego' Category
Two California luxury hotels added to AAA’s 2010 Five Diamond Award list
November 6, 2009 2:45pm
Open less than a year, the Resort at Pelican Hill in Orange County like all hotels, has struggled against the tides of a beleaguered economy. But that doesn’t mean it can’t take a great compliment. The luxury coastal property is one of two California resorts that have danced into the exclusive ranks of AAA’s just-released Five Diamond Award list for 2010. [Corrected at 5:45 p.m. Nov. 6: An earlier version of this post said the Resort at Pelican Hill is south of Laguna Beach. It is north of Laguna Beach.]
California, with 20 five-diamond hotels, also added the opulent Grand del Mar in San Diego to its coffers.
The new Golden State additions join the company of some real longtimers, like the Ritz-Carlton, Laguna Niguel, which has populated the list for 24 consecutive years, and the Peninsula Beverly Hills, with 17 consecutive years under its belt.
San Diego Omni Hotel’s $99 ‘Stuff Your Stocking’ deal
November 5, 2009 5:56am
You don’t need to prove that you’ve been good all year to get this gift from Santa. The Omni San Diego, connected to San Diego’s Petco Park, has a “Stuff Your Stocking” special worth taking advantage of well before Christmas. Guestrooms are on sale starting at $99 per night starting Thanksgiving week and lasting through the New Year’s holiday. Baseball season may be over, but there’s plenty of holiday shopping to be had in San Diego’s Gaslamp Quarter.
Deal: Use the promo code “STOCKING” to get a guestroom for $99 per night, pre-tax, based on availability. But the best part of the deal is that guests will receive a letter upon their departure that enables them to purchase another night at the hotel for $99 in 2010.
Tested: I searched for available dates on the Omni San Diego website and found several, including Nov. 28 (the Saturday after Thanksgiving), Dec. 18-21 and Dec. 24 - 27. The deal was not, however, available for the New Year’s holiday, Dec. 30 - Jan. 1. When I looked for rates outside of the deal, I found a low of $84 on a current 72-hour sale and a rate of $118 for a 21-day advance purchase for rooms Dec. 24 -27. However, the best available rate was listed as $139, pre-tax. I think all these rates are worth jumping on because I’ve been watching this hotel and often see prices of more than $200 and sometimes $300 per night. Granted, that might have been during baseball season.
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 »
For ambitious travelers, Go San Diego card can offer good value
October 29, 2009 8:56am
Are you the kind of traveler who charts a vacation itinerary like a law student might strategize her semester’s course load? Do you consider an afternoon by the pool to be time wasted, preferring to check off items on an attraction-packed list that keeps adults occupied and/or kids happy (and contently and suitably exhausted come night)? Then you may be the ideal candidate for a Go City Card — a pass that gains you admission to select attractions in one of 13 U.S. destinations or in Toronto, Canada.
The Go San Diego Card caught my eye with its offering of entry to more than 50 attractions, including the San Diego Zoo, Legoland and Balboa Park museums. A pass valid for one day costs $65 for an adult, $50 for a child. But multiple-day passes offer far more value: two days for $95/$80 adult/child; three days for $113/$94; five days for $149/$117; and seven days for $180/$135. (The three/five/seven-day pass prices reflect a 10% discount currently available through an online sale.)
Deal or no deal? Well, it depends on how many attractions you can, and want to, visit during your San Diego stay. Getting value out of a one-day pass seems like it would be hard work. Read the rest of this entry »
Pacifica Hotels: 25% off, plus bring a toy for a bigger discount
October 29, 2009 5:51am
For a getaway up or down the coast, or in popular destinations inland, you might look into a stay with Pacifica Hotels. The company, largely rooted in California but with locations in Florida and Hawaii as well, has a great promotion going for late fall and early winter. See below for the scoop.
Deal: Under its current online winter promotion, receive 25% off regular rates at Pacifica Hotels properties over the next couple of months. Plus, if you bring along a new, unwrapped toy valued at $10 or more, you get an additional $10 per night off your bill at checkout. The hotel participates in the Toys for Tots program, so your gift will go to children in need.
The deal is good only in California, where Pacifica runs hotels in in Sonoma, San Francisco, Cambria, Pismo Beach, Santa Barbara, Marina del Rey, Redondo Beach, Laguna Beach and San Diego, among other locations. [Corrected at 10:15 a.m. Oct. 29: An earlier version of this post did not make it clear that this deal is good only at Pacifica hotels in California, not in Florida or Hawaii.] Read the rest of this entry »
Want a hotel in Borrego Springs? Golf course? Landing strip?
October 27, 2009 2:58pm
Borrego Springs, the Southern California desert darling that has lured and bedeviled many a developer over the decades, is giving another one trouble.
Officials at the Borrego Ranch Resort & Spa and Montesoro Golf & Social Club have warned employees that they could shut down as soon as Nov. 30. Then again, one official is quick to say, they might sign on new investors and be fine.
Sasha Itzikman, senior vice president for Borrego Ranch, said the company is “looking for alternative funding sources or new investors, or we’re open to a full sale.”
Borrego Springs, home to about 2,500 people, sits in the middle of San Diego County’s driest back country, surrounded by the vast Anza-Borrego Desert State Park. The stark beauty of that setting — and its location between Los Angeles and San Diego — has led many newcomers to imagine the town as a rival to Palm Springs as an upscale desert hideaway and golf haven.
Investor Gregory Perlman of Sherman Oaks, operating partner for Borrego Ranch and Montesoro, in 2004 began recruiting investors and spending millions to amass and upgrade thousands of acres in the area, including the 42-acre Borrego Ranch Resort (formerly known as the Casa del Zorro) and the 3,140-acre Montesoro golf course and residential community (formerly known as Rams Hill). Lubert-Adler, a Philadelphia-based partnership, is among the largest investors.
The resort and golf-course community, both up for sale, are among the community’s most prominent businesses, and they remain open. In fact, the golf course just opened for the season on Oct. 22. But on Oct. 15, the Borrego Sun newspaper reported that employees had been warned that Borrego Ranch Resort & Spa and Montesoro could close if no investors step up by Nov. 30.
San Diego Zoo & Wild Animal Park — Kids get in free through October
October 20, 2009 9:58am
Family travel tip: Don’t forget that kids get free admission to the San Diego Zoo and San Diego Wild Animal Park during October. The deal is valid for kids 11 years old and younger when accompanied by a paying adult. Normally ticket prices for kids ages 3 to 11 are $26 per child; adult tickets, for ages 12 and older, are $35. If you’ve visited these parks before, here are a few reasons you might want to take another trip.
San Diego Wild Animal Park: The park is celebrating Halloween with “Pumpkins at the Park” on weekends. Have fun with a trick-or-treat scavenger hunt, the Extinct Animal Graveyard and the Hidden Jungle, which has been transformed into the Creepy Crawly Crevasse — with frogs, spiders, scorpions and other creatures that crawl and creep. And kids who bring in a decorated pumpkin for display will get a free carousel ride for their pumpkin donation. The park has set up an area for carnival games, including a beanbag toss and animal races, and there’s also a full pumpkin patch. View the Pumpkins at the park website for a full list of activities, photos and more info.
San Diego Zoo: The Children’s Zoo has a new Discovery Playground presented by Fisher-Price, which features a net tunnel, climbing wall, periscopes, scramble net, talk tubes and a tube slide. Also, if you haven’t seen the zoo’s new Elephant Odyssey, there are lots of play areas for the kids to have fun in addition to viewing the pachyderm’s new $45-million habitat.
Contact: San Diego Zoo
– Jen Leo, Los Angeles Times Travel & Deal blogger
Photo: At San Diego Wild Animal Park, giraffes munch on leafy branches tied to telephone poles. Credit Fred Greaves / For The Times
San Diego: Halloween family fun at Hyatt Regency Mission Bay
October 11, 2009 12:53pm
Is your neighborhood a dud when it comes to Halloween? If you’re thinking about taking a quick getaway over Halloween weekend this year and haunted hotels and haunted houses are a bit too scary or inappropriate for your kids, you might want to consider a quick jaunt down to San Diego. The Hyatt Regency Mission Bay near Sea World is ramping up the Halloween fun for guests from Oct. 30 to Nov. 1, and the room rates won’t scare you one bit.
Halloween travel deal: Room rates starting at $135 per night come with lots of family-friendly Halloween activities, including:
> Three waterslides with haunted music, spooky sounds and lights that will have kids lined up until 10 p.m.
>A spooky family movie in the pool, Halloween s’mores and monster-themed hula-hoop contest.
>Trick-or-treating at several locations in the hotel.
> Halloween-themed pool cabanas for adults.
“We encourage kids to trick-or-treat in costume in our safe family environment and enjoy our many spooky activities ranging from haunted waterslides to Halloween family s’mores,” said Prescott Yee, director of guest services and recreation at the HR Mission Bay.
Kate Morgan, Hotel del Coronado’s longest-term guest – er, ghost
October 11, 2009 9:35am
You’re relaxing in your hotel room, the windows are shut, and you feel a sudden, inexplicable breeze. Or your TV set turns on and off suddenly, seemingly of its own accord. Or you’re lying in bed when, out of nowhere, in the dark of night, your covers are ripped right off of you by the most unexpected of roommates: a ghost.
Welcome to Hotel del Coronado’s Room 3327, where the spirit of the long-deceased Kate Morgan is believed to be resident. In 1892, the young woman — likely 24 years old at the time of her death — spent five days at the San Diego hotel, waiting, it is thought, for her lover, who never arrived.
Her death at the landmark hotel was declared a suicide. But “rumors persist about it being a murder,” said Hotel del Coronado historian Christine Donovan, who wrote the book “Beautiful Stranger: The Ghost of Kate Morgan and the Hotel del Coronado.” Another theory currently being investigated by Donovan and others is that Morgan’s death actually might have been accidental. Read the rest of this entry »
Busch Gardens to keep name after sale; Clydesdales to depart SeaWorld
October 7, 2009 12:24pm
Anheuser-Busch’s sale of SeaWorld and Busch Gardens to the Blackstone Group for $2.7 billion should have little to no impact on the operation of the theme parks, officials said.
The Busch Gardens parks in Tampa, Fla., and Williamsburg, Va., will retain the Busch name as part of the deal, said Jim Atchison, president and chief executive of Busch Entertainment.
The Clydesdale horses stabled at SeaWorld parks in Orlando, Fla., San Antonio and San Diego eventually will be redeployed to other Budweiser marketing initiatives, Atchison said.
