Rosewood Little Dix Bay | 30% off

This bedroom, part of a 2BR Suite at Rosewood Little Dix Bay, looks so incredibly inviting. Little Dix Bay is completing the final touches on its total multi-million renovation. A boutique Caribbean resort with just 80 cottages, suites, and villas — most are nestled along a half-mile crescent beach. The 4BR Hillside Villa features commanding ocean views. First opened in 1964 as an eco-resort by Laurance Rockefeller (Dorado Beach being another former Rockresort in the Caribbean), you'll enjoy space and relaxation during your vacation on Virgin Gorda.

And this exclusive Rosewood Elite offer that can save you 30% off the otherwise Best Available Rate. The rules are simple:

1. Make your booking by the end of 2019.
2. Stays must be completed from December 11th, 2019 to October 31, 2020.
3. That's it ... only two rules!

There is availability for Christmas to New Years, and the 30% Elite Exclusive Opening Offer even applies to Festive Season bookings. Rosewood Elite amenities are included...

• Daily Breakfast for 2 (per bedroom)
• $125 USD Food & Beverage Credit once during the stay
• Upgrade subject to availability on arrival.

copyright (c) 2019 by Ourisman Travel LLC. All rights reserved. We provide Virtuoso and other Preferred Partner amenities as an affiliate of Brownell, a Virtuoso® Member. If you have comments on this column, or questions about booking travel, email me or visit my website.

the magic of Tuscany

I leave for Italy in two days. Along with some colleagues from Brownell Travel, our first three nights will be spent exploring in Tuscany. We're spending Saturday night at Rosewood Castiglion del Bosco (see the video above) and Monday and Tuesday nights at Monteverde Tuscany Resort. From Tuscany, we head to Rome where we'll join the rest of our colleagues on the trip.

Hotel Eden will be our home on Wednesday night, and I'm especially looking forward to see this new newly renovated Dorchester Collection hotel. Thursday afternoon will be quite special day with a tour of Rome by Vespa (with an experienced driver/guide actually driving the thing). Not sure how it will work lugging a Canon R camera while hanging on for dear life, but I'm anticipating this brand new way of seeing Rome. Click here if you'd like to experience Rome by Vespa.

I'll tell you about the four days after Rome in a future blog ... but — hint — it will be a moving experience worthy of an ovation.

copyright (c) 2019 by Ourisman Travel LLC. All rights reserved. We provide Virtuoso and other Preferred Partner amenities as an affiliate of Brownell, a Virtuoso® Member. If you have comments on this column, or questions about booking travel, email me or visit my website.

Kona Beach Village | reopening in 2022

beachfront cottage at Kona Beach Village (c) 2019 by David Ourisman, all rights reserved

Kona Beach Village, a quick walk down the beach from Four Seasons Hualalai, has been closed since the tsunami of 2011. During my last visit to the Big Island, I walked through the 81-acre property, even venturing into some of the old cottages. Though not luxurious by contemporary standards, it's easy to see why KBV guests so loved the resort. They were very casual, and that was the charm. The bungalows offered a true sand-between-your-toes beach experience. Some cottages, like the one pictured above, were set directly adjacent to the beach.

Kona Village, a Rosewood Resort is set to re-open in 2022. It will feature 150 completely new standalone hales, each with private lanai and outdoor shower. Shipwreck Bar will be resurrected, and guests will enjoy multiple dining venues, spa, fitness center, multiple pools, and tennis courts.

I expect the new KBV to be fully five-star and can't wait to see what Rosewood will bring to the Big Island of Hawaii. I'm certain that Rosewood Elite amenities will be offered, and the resort will presumably join Virtuoso.

copyright (c) 2019 by Ourisman Travel LLC. All rights reserved. We provide Virtuoso and other Preferred Partner amenities as an affiliate of Brownell, a Virtuoso® Member. If you have comments on this column, or questions about booking travel, email me or visit my website.

one of Time's 100 greatest places in the world

façade of Hôtel de Crillon (c) 2018 by David Ourisman, all rights reserved

This week's issue of Time Magazine published its list of one hundred of "the world's greatest places" (Vol. 192, No. 9-10, pp 72-96). The first of the places listed? Hôtel de Crillon, the elegant palace hotel right on Place de la Concorde, right at the foot of the Champs Élysées. The largest square in Paris, its view encompasses the Arc du Triomphe to the west, the Louvre to the east, and the French National Assembly directly across the Seine to the south. The most convenient location in Paris, no less than three metro lines assure quick connections to most anyplace you might want to visit.

What about the Crillon? Time wrote the following:

Few hotels have a history as rich as Hôtel de Crillon, which was commissioned as a palace by King Louis XV and once hosted Marie Antoinette's piano lessons. Last July, the residence — now owned by Rosewood Hotels & Resorts — re-opened after a four-year renovation that brought modern amenities like central air-conditioning while preserving its iconic 18th century finishings, including gold ceilings, grand staircases and marble walls.

I had the privilege of staying at the Crillon last April. A truly stunning hotel, I spent two nights in a Grand Premier Suite whose living room is pictured below. Elegantly residential, it felt like an apartment, not a hotel room. I even had a peak at the Eiffel Tower through the windows. Consult your Virtuoso and Rosewood Elite travel advisor to make this booking — you'll receive complimentary breakfasts each morning of your stay, a $100 food and beverage credit, early 10 a.m. check-in, late 4 p.m. check-out, and a great chance of getting an upgraded room when you arrive.

copyright  (c)  2018 by Ourisman Travel LLC.  All rights reserved. We provide Virtuoso and other Preferred Partner amenities as an affiliate of Brownell, a Virtuoso® member. If you have comments on this column, or questions about booking travel, email me or visit our website.

so much better than booking.com ...

booking.com quote for Le Meurice as of 2:50 p.m. PDT, June 25, 2017

Rick Steves posted a Facebook article yesterday in which he offered his alternative to making hotel bookings through online wholesalers like booking.com and expedia.com. Hotels have to pay a 20-25% commission to OTA's (online travel agencies) in return for having their rooms available online. He advises travelers to contact hotels directly and negotiate:

Those who book direct through a hotel’s website (and not through the booking agency site, thus saving the hotel about 20 percent) can be offered a free breakfast or free upgrade. Or, simply don’t book “online.” Just book by direct email or phone, in which case, hotels are free to give you whatever price they like (usually able to split the difference: charging 10 percent less and making 10 percent more).

You don't need this hassle! Over 1250 luxury hotels around the world already offer an even richer set of value-added amenities through Virtuoso, the world's leading consortium of luxury travel advisors, hotels, cruise lines, and tour companies. And we can often do even better than Virtuoso, thanks to our relationship with all the leading hotel companies in the world — Four Seasons, Ritz-Carlton, Dorchester Collection, Rosewood, Belmond, Peninsula, etc.

Free breakfast is already negotiated, as is an upgrade upon availability (sometimes guaranteed at booking), as is an extra amenity valued at $100, as is free WiFi... and we'll even contact the hotel to VIP your stay.

We can do so much better than booking.com for luxury hotel bookings. Say you want to spend the evening of August 4 at Le Meurice, one of my very favorite hotels in the world.

Booking.com offers the "jackpot deal" seen at the top of this article: Double Room — $963 without breakfast, $1028 with breakfast

Here's what's available to me right now as a Dorchester Diamond Club agent: I can book a Classic Room at 760€ = $850. As a Diamond Club booking, my clients receive a guaranteed upgrade at booking to a Superior Room. And there's more! You get ...

• a 100€ hotel credit that can come right off your bill, so you pay 660€ = $739 with breakfast.
• a full breakfast, in any venue including in-room dining, literally anything on the menu except caviar and alcohol. Tax and gratuity are included.
• full premium internet access for unlimited devices.

Assuming you'll want to have breakfast at the Alain Ducasse restaurant at Le Meurice, you save $289, get personal recognition as a Diamond Club guest, get free internet, and order anything off the breakfast menu, service included!

copyright (c) 2017 by Ourisman Travel LLC. All rights reserved. We provide Virtuoso and other Preferred Partner amenities as an affiliate of Brownell, a Virtuoso® Member. If you have comments on this column, or questions about booking travel, email me or visit my website.

I blame the bean counters at Marriott

view from the Club Lounge at Ritz Carlton Half Moon Bay

Ritz Carlton is truly one of my favorite hotel brands. It is for this very reason that I want to push back against the new cancellation policy being instituted by Marriott, its corporate parent. A few Ritz Carlton hotels still have a one day cancel deadline (Buckhead!), but most Ritz Carlton hotels now adhere to the 2-3 day cancelation deadline that is the new Marriott standard.

I blame the bean counters. This self-inflicted corporate unfriendliness is bad news for guests and bad news for Marriott Luxury Brands. I have nothing but the highest admiration for the ladies and gentlemen of Ritz Carlton, among the warmest and most gracious hosts in the entire luxury hotel industry. This unfortunate policy makes life harder for everyone, especially their business guests who need flexibility when they travel for business. What the Marriott bean counters may not appreciate is that this also makes life harder both for their travel partners (luxury travel advisors like myself) and for our Ritz Carlton Guardian Angels. I'm thinking of all the time I'll waste requesting waivers of cancellation penalties ... and the time my Guardian Angels will waste working on exceptions for my clients.

I acknowledge that cancellation penalties can serve a valid function. Once a room has been sold, it's "off the market" and cannot be resold. Last-minute cancellations do not leave enough time to re-sell that room. It's reasonable for the guest to compensate the hotel in the form of a one-night penalty if the cancellation prevents the hotel from selling the room to someone else. But unless a hotel is nearing a sell-out, nothing is really lost.

My appeal to the bean counters... read the Mission Statement of Ritz Carlton, and realize how this policy contradicts that mission:

The Ritz-Carlton Hotel is a place where the genuine care and comfort of our guests is our highest mission.  

We pledge to provide the finest personal service and facilities for our guests who will always enjoy a warm, relaxed, yet refined ambience.  

The Ritz-Carlton experience enlivens the senses, instills well-being, and fulfills even the unexpressed wishes and needs of our guests. 

My appeal to my clients and fans of Ritz Carlton: vote with your dollars. You don't have to tolerate minimum 3-day cancel deadlines at city hotels. The only way the bean counters will get the message is for us to send our business to their worthy competitors. Just checked a random day in New York City, and the cancel deadline is just one day at Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, Fairmont (The Plaza), Peninsula, Park Hyatt, and Rosewood (The Carlyle). 

copyright (c) 2017 by Ourisman Travel LLC. All rights reserved. We provide Virtuoso and other Preferred Partner amenities as an affiliate of Brownell, a Virtuoso® Member. If you have comments on this column, or questions about booking travel, email me or visit my website.

room upgrades | the holy grail of hotel stays

Ocean View Prime Suite at FS Hualalai

I can't show the comic strip, as King Features wanted $60 for a one-time license, but go to the Rhymes with Orange website and click back to the April 15th cartoon. Cinderella is standing in front of "The Enchanted Forest Rental Desk" to rent a pumpkin coach. The rental agent, a flying fairy godmother complete with wand, informs her, There are no more pumpkin coaches on the lot, but for the same price we can upgrade you to a butternut squash.*

Room upgrades are the holy grail of luxury hotel stays. For many hotels and resorts, the only difference between a less inexpensive lead-in room and higher room categories is the view. A great example is the Four Seasons Maui where lead-in Mountainside rooms look away from the ocean with a view of the roof of the parking garage. Higher room categories (Garden, Partial Ocean, Ocean View, and Ocean View Prime) have progressively better views. So a room upgrade is a valuable perk that can save you $100 every night of your stay, depending on time of year.

How can you increase your chances of getting a coveted room upgrade? Find a luxury travel consultant who

(1) is a preferred partner of your favorite hotel families. Brownell Travel has preferred partner relationships with Four Seasons, Ritz Carlton, Mandarin Oriental, Park Hyatt, Orient Express, and Rosewood, among other luxury brands. We are among a handful of agencies that are the biggest producers for these brands, and our clients go to the top of the upgrade list.

(2) is a member of Virtuoso, or another consortium with negotiated amenities such as Signature or FHR. These perks include room upgrades on check-in, subject to availability, at over 900 five star hotels and resorts around the world.

(3) has personal relationships with sales managers at the hotels you want to book. If you send a lot of guests to certain hotels, and work with sales managers to VIP your clients, they get to know you and will often try to guarantee an upgrade in advance.

It can help if you are a frequent guest of certain hotels. So when you find a hotel you love, stay with it! Your own relationship, especially when combined with that of your travel consultant, will help you score a room upgrade!

room upgrade (search here on Google)

*Hilary B. Price, "Rhymes with Orange" (April 15, 2012)


copyright (c) 2012 by David Ourisman LLC. All rights reserved. If you have comments on this column, or questions about booking travel, email me or visit my website.
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