Rome - iQ Hotel Roma

iQ Hotel Roma:
via Firenza, 8 Roma

Termini station to iQ Hotel Roma:

After a comfortable first class ride from Florence to Rome's main train station (Termini), we looked at the map at the station.  It was approximate 10-15 minutes walk from termini to the hotel.  I googled map it the night before, so it wasn't too hard to find (must not repeat the "lost in Venice" incident again).

Lots of drinks to pick from...cheap too :)

General comments about hotel:
- hotel room was quite small

- the two beds were movable

- bathroom was very clean

- very nice terrace upstairs, must spend a night there chilling with snack and wine, play some fuse balls

- vending machines upstairs

- very good location, easy/moderate walk from hotel to Colosseum, Pantheon and Trevi fountain

- we pretty much walked to everywhere from hotel...even to spanish steps...etc....  

  - easy walk to metro

  - highly recommended ! :)

Florence - Hotel: Best Western Premier Hotel Laurus

Best Western Preimer Hotel Laurus: 

1 Double Bed, Non-smoking room

Hotel Review:
Hotel Location: Very convenient, 5 minutes walk to the Duomo, 7-10 minutes walk to the train station, 7 minutes walk to the Galleria Dell Accademia, 1 minute walk to shopping district

Room: Very spacious, bed is very comfortable, very clean overall

Wifi access: wifi access included, yet it asked you to log in with their complicated access code like every 5 minutes, very inconvenient.

Guest service: Quite helpful with directions

Breakfast:  Not included.  But there's a nice cafe that was located right beside the lobby with SUPER GOOD and FRESH pastry.  Great price too.  It was 1 Euro per pastry and 2 Euro for a nice cup of cappuccino

Complimentary: Bottle of red wine (coupon from TripAdvisor) & 1 free drink/person at their roof terrace

View: Magnificent View from the Terrace, you can see how close the hotel was located from the Duomo

Bathroom: Washroom is quite clean and spacious.  Shampoo provided only, no conditioner.  Their shampoo products were not good at all.

My thoughts of the Best Western Premier:
Walkable distance to almost everywhere we wanted to go (except for Piazzale Michaelangelo, Pisa and the Outlet).  We really liked the cafe beside the hotel (opens only in the morning).  Very comfortable bed, the room was very spacious.  There was a lot of storage space.

Price was a little expensive: $686 Cdn for 3 nights.  We didn't regret staying here, we love this hotel. When we got tired, we just walked back to the hotel room to take a break or to take a nap.

Venice - last night in Venezia

Last night in Venezia was even more quieter than the first night.  Having dinner right beside the canal should be quite romantic.  We weren't that hungry after the tiny snack from St. Mark's square (San Macro).  There were night gondola rides available, I heard it was more expensive.  I don't think there's much to see at night; it was so dark everywhere along the canal.  There were hardly lights, especially the smaller alleys and smaller canals.  I guess it could be more mysterious.

Display of the Venetian Seafood

bits and pieces at night

The alleys in Venice were so narrow, the most narrowest street in Paris couldn't compare.  The government did such a good job to preserve all the buildings and streets so vintage.  

The vending machine for cigarettes.  No ID needed.  How convenient for the smokers.  I'm glad they don't have this anymore in Canada.

During our walk back to the hotel, we saw a group of young people doing crazy things for their bachelor party.  I saw this guy who wore a big paper sign with a hole in it.  I believe he didn't wear a pant.  I didn't really walk closer to have a closer look.  I was too distracted walking by a dead rat right in the middle of the road.  I didn't know how the rat just died in the middle of the road, I wonder if it was stepped by someone, because it looked like it had been pressed and there were no cars nor bikes in Venice.  

There were millions of bridges in Venice, they were all nicely built.  So arties.  We got hungry again and we didn't want to spend that much money,  so we just walked back to the hotel's snack room and filled our stomach with their snacks.  Their selection of drinks was pretty awesome.

One thing I should have done and I missed it: I should have tried their Tiramisu.  I heard the Venetian Tiramisu is quite unique, and all Italian cities have their own unique ways of making Tiramisu.   But I find all restaurants have different textures and taste of tiramisu in Italy, because they all have their own homemade recipes.  But Tiramisu and cappuccino are must try when you travel to Italy :)

Venice - UNA Hotel Venezia

Hotel selection:
We researched so many hotels, and we picked this :) The room was very clean and elegantly furnished. A lot of other hotels in Venice looked kind of old, we were looking for a convenient location and a clean washroom.

Washroom basic in Italy:
Most washrooms in Italy have two "toilets", but the second one is not really a toilet, it's a bidet.  The purpose of the bidet is to clean off the back/butt after using the toilet.  Italians really enjoy their time in their washrooms, so usually they keep them very clean. (learn how to use a bidet)

It was hard to shower for me, as you could tell the bath tub only had half of the glass.  I still don't get the purpose of that.  Most hotels in Italy didn't provide hair conditioners, they only provided shampoo and soap.  We had to call for conditioner separately, along with bath ropes and bath salt :)  They provided a list for us if we needed any extra supplies.  Pretty good service.

The room was quite expensive, probably about $200-250 Cad per night.  They didn't have free internet; internet was $14.95/day.

Common area:

Lounge: breakfast buffet and happy hours that provided free goodies

The lounge was amazing.  It opened from 7:30am - 10:30am for excellent breakfast buffet.  Then the lounge was re-opened from 2:30pm - 10pm for happy hours where they provided free pastries, coffee, drinks, alcohol, fruits, water....etc.  Water in Europe was very expensive!  Their yoga juice was super good, so fruity and smooth.  We kept drinking them and took a few bottles when we went out for the day!

Expresso machine was available with illy capsules.....pretty good! except the foam function didn't really work....

We would definitely come back for this hotel, only at a reasonable price!  Hotels on the actual island were usually quite expensive, but it was well worth it for us.  The hotel was located away from the main tourist area, we like the quietness.   The location of the hotel was quite convenient that we always walked back when we forgot something.

Venice - Arrival

Venice - First day:

Once we arrived at the airport, the wait for the luggages was pretty quick.  I researched for several commute options to our hotel.  We could get there by bus, water taxi or by boat.  I originally picked the bus one.  I went to the information centre to ask for directions to our hotel, and the counter person told me it was best to go by boat.  Why? Because if we took the bus, we eventually had to take the boat anyway, so why not just take the boat from the beginning? Right, points taken.  So we bought the boat tickets for 15 Euro each.  We walked to the port, but we didn't know which boat to get on and which station we needed to get off from.  One of the staff searched it online for us and told us to get off at the second station.  I was surprised I couldn't find any map on the way, I probably missed it somewhere.

So we got on to the bus, and everyone had a map out.  I had nothing.  So basically we just knew we had to get off at the second stop and then we had to figure our way to the hotel in Venice.  For those of you who had been to Venice.......You would understand the frustration.

We passed by the Murano, the island that is well known for their glass making.  We weren't interested after glancing at the island.  Once we got off the boat.... The streets were empty.  There was nobody to ask.  There were only a few tourists looking for directions.  We walked back and forth to see if there's any big direction map.  NOPE.

very Vintage and quiet...super dead

Hey, here! We found a local:

Meow~

We were so lost, we didn't know where we were.  I had no choice but taking out my iPhone and google map where we were and searched for the walking distance to the hotel.  ROAMING DATA.  We searched a couple of times and figured we were only 5 minutes walk from our hotel.  1.4MB of data costed me $47 canadian dollars - a 5 seconds click........

We had to carry our luggages to cross two bridges...there were no bikes nor cars (so make sure you pack light)

Near our hotel, super quiet

There we were! After all the frustration, we finally found our hotel!

We were looking for some big hotel signage.  It was hard to find in the beginning.  Good that we had the street number.  I guess they would to keep the vintage look of the island.  The whole island looked very vintage.  There were hardly any locals walking in the streets.  A lot of the buildings looked empty.   It was quite quiet.  We read that those from most tour groups and cruises don't stay overnights on the Venice island, that's why it was so quiet at night in Venice.  

Once we checked in, we got the gift from heaven (free):

gift from HEAVEN!

Moral of the day: MUST GET A MAP IN VENICE

Paris - le Citizen's hotel breakfast

Le citizen's hotel's breakfast:

So every morning in Paris, we went to this "lounge" for breakfast buffet.  

Fresh pastries, bread, toasts, cereal, fruits and parfaits

The hotel's receptionist always approached us to help us with drinks.  She usually offered to make fresh orange juice and expresso beverages :)  Very helpful staff.  We saw some other guests who had eggs, so we also asked for scramble eggs.  Eggs were the only hot dish they offered for the breakfast.

Expresso Machine that made great expresso, mocha, cappuccino and cafe latte...:)

Quite a comfortable cafe area to chill in the morning ..designed with simple furnitures

This was the last day for our stay in Paris.  The helpful receptionist helped us to find another couple to split our private car cost to the airport.  So instead of paying 60 Euros, we only had to pay 30 euros.  The ride to airport was approximately 45 minutes with rush hour traffic.

Paris - Hotel selection

Paris:

We did a lot of research on the hotels in Paris.  The ones that are close to the Eiffel Tower are very expensive and vintage (aka: old).  There are a lot of negative reviews on many hotels from trip advisor.ca, people complained about huge spiders, bed bugs and dirty rooms, etc.  After careful considerations, we picked Le citizen hotel.  

Le Citizen hotel:
 - near the Canal St. Martin (very quiet and peaceful, yet it was very hard for taxi drivers to find)
 - one of the top ranking hotels from Tripadvisor
 - super clean from traveller's photos (I love looking at traveller's photos as the hotel's photos are usually deceiving

          

 - breakfast and minibar are included: freshly made scramble eggs, freshly made special coffee drink..yummy pastry..etc etc
 - the staff were the nicest and most helpful people I had met in Paris
 - excellent services - Excellent website to provide all the info you need
                             - I booked their private car to pick us up from train station.  only 15 Euro
                             - They answered their emails promptly 
                             - 10 minutes walk to the metro
                             - Window faces the Canal St. Martin
                             - Offered iPad at no cost for us to use in every room
                             - They sold their own (Le citizen) stamps! So I could mail out the postcards!
                             - There's always a person at the front desk to open door for you even you go back to the hotel late.   None of them would frown at you when you get back to the hotel late (apparently some other hotels' staff do)
- On our last day, we booked a private car & driver to airport, the front desk kindly found another couple that would split the taxi bill with us.....60 Euro -> 30 Euro!  Awesome
- Staff spoke perfect English (sounded like American English to me)
- Comfortable bed.....
- We love this hotel....but Price was a little $$.  Compared to other hotels, the price was quite reasonable for the quality :) Very satisfied.

Canal St. Martin

Our window view

London - Arrival

Arrival to London (Sept 2012):

We took Air transat from YVR -> London Gatwick Airport.  
In the beginning, we worried about this budget flight would be a very uncomfortable ride as the flight tickets are a lot cheaper than other airlines.  I did some research on it, and some said it's those old planes that the passengers had to share the tiny tv monitors....

Yet, the flight journey was a lot better than we expected.  No, we didn't have to share any tv monitors, we each had a touch screen tablet with a lot of movie/tv selections in their program.  The seats were comfortable and it was a peaceful and quiet flight journey:)

Arrival to the hotel: 
Once we arrived to the airport, we went to the train station and we took the train from Gatwick to Clapham Junction.  After we arrived to the Clapham Junction, we weren't sure about the directions to our hotel, so I went to ask one of the staff for directions.  Friendly staff told us that the hotel is only 10 - 15 minutes walk from the train station.  When I showed them our hotel's address, the page had a list of all other hotels from the other cities.  The staff kindly teased about our Euro trip's itinerary and he showed his other colleagues about our busy vacation schedule.  Anyway, we followed his directions and we carried our luggage.  We walked on the uneven stone road/sidewalk, it was getting hot and the jet lag was kicking in.  The walk was actually longer than we expected but we did finally make it to our nice hotel :)



Hotel Verta by Rhombus  - Battersea
We arrived London early in the morning, so we checked in and we had a nice breakfast buffet at the hotel.  The hotel room was nice: spacious with a scenic view.  It faces the River Thames and the heliport.  The room was very quiet, the windows were thick enough that we didn't hear any noise from the heliport.