Hotels

Just to set the ground rules, we want you to use this site as we do - a resource for as many of our travel needs as possible. We enjoy writing about the places we love, and we will continue to do so both on this site and on our travel blog. But when it comes time to go, we want to be able to see as many choices as possible for booking all the mundane parts - the flights, hotels and cars that we all need to make our trips that experience of a lifetime. We prefer the hotel sites that don't actually charge your credit card until you arrive at the hotel. More on that below. But having said that, there are often deals to be had at sites such as Hotels.com, who have just announced that they have dropped change and cancellation fees on lodging bookings! But if you are like us, you find that you enjoy going back to properties or even chains that treat you well and make you comfortable. Here is a link to some hotels we have enjoyed in the past.

In keeping with our idea of staying in one place long enough to enjoy it, here's a unique idea: why not rent an apartment, home or villa for a night, a week or even a month - anywhere in the world?  Sounds like a good idea, you say?  They you need to visit iStopOver:

There are of course other options for booking hotels, from the small "boutique" sites all the way to the big booking engines. Occasionally it is possible to get some specialty hotels and even apartments from these sites, and since we focus on and spend a lot of time in Europe, we have two good European alternatives. We particularly like both these choices because there are no hidden fees, and your credit card is only used as a reference. It is only charged by the hotel depending on their rules - it is not charged beforehand. Note that this is not true for many of the large "booking engines", so compare carefully!

The first is Venere, an Italian company with availability for hotels, apartments and even B&B's: