Yearly Archives: 2012

Where to Stay in Lisbon?

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When Ryan and I originally started thinking about our 2012 trip, we were set on Spain. However, at some point, we started to consider a combined Portugal and Spain trip. I still haven’t recapped our honeymoon, but when I do, I’ll share how tough it was to stay at so many different hotels. I love the convenience of staying in one place, but realistically that won’t ever happen on a trip to Europe. There are too many places to see and visit!

After a little discussion, we began adjusting our itinerary to fit in 3 nights in Lisbon, Portugal’s capital. I really didn’t (and still don’t) know too much about Lisbon, but I do know that it looks like San Francisco! Don’t believe me? Check out a few pictures (pictures found here, here, and here):

We’ve stayed in San Francisco a few times (usually we just do day trips or, more recently, I stay with friends) and there’s really a few areas I like to stay. One is by Union Square and the mall. The other is by the ferry building on Embarcadero. I’m sure there are tons of great places to stay, and there are restaurants and bars everywhere, but in my limited experience, those are my favorite. Since our Europe trip won’t be a “shopping” trip, I just figured we’d stay by the water. Turns out the downtown area (and the popular places to stay) aren’t near the water. I had a difficult time trying to figure out which city would be best. Chiado? Baixa? Bairro Alto? The names of the cities were being thrown around in forums we read, but without knowing which restaurants we wanted to try or which local attractions we wanted to be close to, it was hard to choose a city.

We decided to start out with our “wants” and see which types of hotels/B&Bs/apartments we could find. Here’s what our perfect accomodation would be:

  • in an area with restaurants that are very close
  • in a “cute” neighborhood
  • close to bus/train stops so we can get around the city
  • provides breakfast
  • a smaller hotel – not a huge chain hotel, since we are staying in at least a couple of those in Spain
  • has a pool
  • has free (or cheap) wifi
  • room with a view and/or balcony
  • around 100 euros a night (in our research we noticed that we could get away without spending a ton in Lisbon)

After just a few days of seriously looking, we found and booked a room for our 3 nights in Lisbon! I found a place that looked promising and sent it over to Ryan. He loved it, so last night, we booked! We can cancel up to 15 days before our stay and pay no penalty at all. There was only one room left (the one we wanted) in this small, 3-room B&B in Baixa, so we jumped on the opportunity to book. Without further ado, here are some pictures of Orange 3 House:

The room was inexpensive (315 euros total), we have a view (see above), breakfast is included, free wifi, convenient location and a small hotel! So far, this seems like the perfect place for us. We may still look around a bit, but this is definitely the best we’ve seen!

Starwood Hotels in Barcelona

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Ryan and I are in the beginning stages of planning our next vacation. We actually started talking about it before our honeymoon, because there is nothing more depressing than coming back from a long vacation and having nothing to look forward to. There are several places we want to visit (especially in Europe) and we decided that 2012 would be the year for a Spain trip! We’ve done some preliminary research and we think we’ve decided on some destinations. However, the city we started with was Barcelona! We aren’t sure at which hotel we are going to stay, but we want to stay at a Starwood hotel (and use points) to save money.

hotel barcelona spain W

I found this hotel when we first starting talking about Spain and I fell in love! I’m a sucker for ocean views and large rooms with balconies. This hotel is 20,000 starpoints/night, which would be 60,000 (assuming we stay 3 nights). We have the points and could use them, but there are other hotels we’ve been thinking about staying at, and it would be nice to save points when possible.

Pros:

  • This hotel is relatively new, so the rooms are all very nice.
  • There is a pool/bar area which looks fabulous!
  • The views from this hotel are breathtaking.

Cons:

  • Location. It’s not as centrally-located as the other option.
  • We would use 60,000 starpoints, instead of saving some for a different trip.
  • There is no guarantee that we’ll get a nice room overlooking the ocean. I am a gold member, but upgrades are not guaranteed, and we’ll be going during the summer/fall, which is a popular time to visit. So, the hotel will still have nice views, but maybe not from our room.

Le Meridien Barcelona, Spain hotel

Pros:

  • Location is great – right off of Las Ramblas, which is the place to be in Barcelona.
  • This is “only” 16k starpoints per night, so we’d save 12k starpoints, assuming we stay 3 nights.
  • Recent renovations by https://fdinsulation.com/crawl-space-insulation/ experts, so the rooms will be nice.

Cons:

  • No pool. I’m not sure how much time we’d spend at a pool though, so this might not be a big deal.
  • Not a nice view (city views are okay, but I wouldn’t pay big money for the view we’ll get from this hotel).

So really, we have to figure out what’s important to us. Since we are early in our planning, it’s hard to know what our tentative schedule will look like. Will we have time to hang around the pool? Exactly how far away is the W, and is it going to be a huge pain? Is there an easy way to get from the W to the center of the city? Will we be going out late at night, without a way to get back to the W (if we stay there)?

(Post originally written in January 2012.  Since then we have decided to book the W Barcelona for our stay.)