[Black Friday] Marriott 40%-off Sale in Europe, Middle East and Africa
Marriott has started its Black Friday sale, which is valid for stays in Europe, Middle East and Africa.
You can access the offer here.
- Book by November 30
- Stay by January 10, 2021
- 40% off best flexible rate at participating hotels
- Certain brands, including Ritz Carlton, St Regis, Luxury Collection and Design hotels are excluded
- Some hotels may only have availability for weekend stays
You could search on Marriott’s homepage as usual with code QRI to filter the results.
I was shocked when I saw the stay-by date – what the hell is in their mind to think that people would rush to travel in the next six weeks, with the pandemic still going so strong?
Here are some example rates in London:
- W London – £213
- London Marriott Hotel County Hall – £189
- JW Marriott Grosvenor House London – £219
- Residence Inn London Bridge – £83
- London Marriott Hotel Kensington – £113
To be honest they don’t look 40% off to me – the hotels might have adjusted their best flexible rates in time for the promotion.
[Black Friday] IHG 30%-off UK & Europe sale
Our first Black-Friday post – IHG has started their sale early this year.
You can access IHG’s promotion page here. As you may have realised, it’s not really a new offer. “More To See” is a promotion that IHG started earlier this year and has been going on for a while, although the actual content has altered a few times.
In terms of the BF edition:
- Book by January 10th, 2021
- Stay between December 4th, 2020 and April 30th, 2021
- Valid for hotels in the UK and Europe
- You save 32% off the best flexible rate (including 2% member-exclusive)
- Free cancellation allowed 72 hours before check-in
Look for the Book Now Pay Later rate plan when you search:
Here are some London hotels I found, for the first Saturday of December:
- InterContinental London Park Lane £192
- InterContinental London The O2 £134
- Crowne Plaza Kings Cross £67
- Crowne Plaza London Kensington £65
- Hotel Indigo Paddington £59
The rates are not bad, but to be honest I was expecting something more from IHG. At least I thought they’d re-run the 2-for-1 flash sale which was offered a few months ago.
€20 rebate on Accor stays via their Super Points promotion
Amongst all hotel groups Accor isn’t the most keen or creative in terms of publishing bonus points offers. They have just launched a very good offer though for your stays in the UK and Europe.
You need to register here. Like always the t&s is unclear and somewhat conflictual, but I believe the offer is:
- Book by 16 November
- Stay by 13 December
- Valid for select countries in Europe and Central Asia
- You earn 1000 bonus points if your stay includes a Fri, Sat and Sun night, or 500 bonus points otherwise
- It’s triggered on your first five eligible stays
Full list of participating countries is: Andorra, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia , Malta, Monaco, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Réunion, Saint Martin and French Guyana.
There’s no minimum-stay requirement, therefore you could stay just one night at a cheap Ibis hotel and bag 1000 points which is worth €20.
Note the usual gotchas though: only new bookings after registration count, and don’t part-pay you booking using points!
Radisson Hotels 25% off EMEA sale
Radisson hotels has just launched a new promotion in Europe, Middle East and Africa.
You can access the offer page here.
- Book by October 21
- Stay by February 28, 2021
- Discount is 10% – 25% at Radisson Edwardian hotels, for all other brands it seems to be a flat 25%
- Reservations are cancellable 24 hours prior to arrival
I checked some UK hotels:
- Park Plaza Westminster Bridge London £111
- The May Fair, A Radisson Collection Hotel £213
- Park Plaza London Park Royal £64
- The Edwardian Manchester, A Radisson Collection Hotel £123
- Park Plaza Cardiff £86
The rate is not very impressive – at the same discount (25%) Marriott chooses to throw in breakfast as well. If you find anything that suits your plan though, don’t forget to register to the current Radisson promotion to earn 5000 bonus points per stay.
My Review of the Lufthansa Senator Lounge, Munich T2
Finally a chance to utilise my matched TAP Portugal Gold status! Having an early evening flight back to London, I decided to come to the airport a bit early to try out the Lufthansa lounge.
Being one of the two hubs, Munich has a total of 11 Lufthansa lounges, which is very impressive! For comparison, BA has “only” 7 departure lounges between T3 and T5 at Heathrow.
However, due to the current situation only three of them are open: one business lounge and one Senator lounge, which are next to each other; and the Senator cafe. All three are in the Schengen departure area, so do not cross the border too early if you are flying to the UK!
The two lounges are close to gate G28, which is a short walk from the security check.
After showing my boarding pass, I’m guided to the left-hand side leading to the Senator section, reserved for Star Gold members. The concept of Senator lounges is a nice touch from Lufthansa, as they are usually slightly better than the business counterpart and convey the airline’s appreciation of loyal customers.
The inside area is not huge – on the left there’s a dining area, and on the right there’s a semi-enclosed, and quieter room if you need some space to yourself.
Further down there are some work desks, and a few lounge chairs for you to lie down.
In terms of food, there are two options on offer: chicken drumsticks and potato stew. I find the quality excellent, especially the former – I’d probably rank it as one of the most tasty food I’ve had in any airport lounge!
The food station and bar are staff-serviced. You can also help yourself to snacks and desserts – the chocolate with cream toppings is also very nice.
I like the interior design of this lounge. It feels different to the other Lufthansa lounges I’ve been to, probably as I don’t see much dark grey or brown colours here, and the overall theme is a lot brighter. All in all, I really enjoyed my experience here, and thank you TAP Portugal 😉!
Double dip on the Amex Leading Hotels of the World offer
American Express has added quite a few hotel offers recently, including Marriott, Hilton and IHG. I have very happily saved all of them, but today I’d like to talk about a different hotel group.
You may have this offer appearing on your card account:
Maybe you’ve never heard of the name Leading Hotels of the World, but don’t just close the tab yet! Similar to GHA Discovery or Small Luxury Hotels, LHW is a soft-branded hotel alliance for high-end independent hotels, therefore you can expect some very good properties here.
The full list of participating hotels is here, covering UK and some European countries. Interestingly, the following hotels are affiliated with another hotel group too:
- Hotel Kamp, Helsinki (Nordic Choice)
- Royal Monceau Raffles, Paris (Accor)
- Fairmont Hotel Vier Jahreszeiten, Hamburg (Accor)
- Hotel Adlon Kempinski, Berlin (GHA)
- Gran Melia Fenix, Madrid (Melia)
- Gran Melia Colon, Seville (Melia)
- Gran Melia Palacio de Isora, Tenerife (Melia)
- ME Ibiza, Ibiza (Melia)
- 7Pines Kempinski, Ibiza (GHA)
- Gran Melia Hotel de Mar, Mallorca (Melia)
So you could book via the respective group, enjoy elite benefits and earn points, and also get the Amex cashback!
You must ensure that you get charged directly by the hotel though, not by the hotel group or any third-party aggregator. If you pay at check-out it’s definitely fine (no matter through what website you booked), but for prepaid rates you should be careful – I vaguely remember that my Melia booking was charged by the group instead of hotel once, but I may be wrong.
Fly BA in flat bed to Athens and Larnaca!
We talked about BA’s ludicrous sale a week ago, and a new trick has just emerged which you could use in combination.
We know that BA (and other airlines) sometimes flies wide-bodies in short-haul routes, most notably between London and Madrid for cargo reasons. It appears that BA’s Athens and Larnaca routes are also on 787 rotation at the moment, for the following dates:
- Heathrow – Athens BA632 2/9/16/23 October 12:40-18:25
- Athens – Heathrow BA633 2/9/16/23 October 19:55-21:45
- Heathrow – Larnaca BA662 1/8/15/22 October 11:15-17:55
- Larnaca – Heathrow BA663 1/8/15/22 October 19:25-22:15
You can tell they are operated by 787, clicking the flight details:
Selecting business class, you are presented an unusual seat map: not 2-2 (Club Europe) or 2-4-2 (Club World), but 2-3-2 instead. So it looks like you’ll sit in the World Traveller Plus cabin, i.e. premium economy instead.
If you are lucky enough, they may open the Club World cabin on the day so you’ll have a proper flat bed; but anyway flying a wide-body is usually a much more pleasure experience than on a narrow one. However, remember that the aircraft type is not guaranteed, therefore it could be switched at last minute.
Both Athens and Larnaca are on the 160-TP list, so you only need three roundtrips to hit BA silver. You have until 30 September to book.
IHG Europe flash sale, save at least 30%!
IHG has just extended its More to See promotion, but changed the format slightly this time.
- Valid for hotels in the UK and Europe
- Book by 14 October
- Stay by 11 April 2021
- Save at least 30% off Best Flexible Rate
- Minimum 3 days advance booking
- Refundable up to 14 days in advance
Compared to the previous edition, there is no longer three-night minimum stay required, which is good news.
The rate plan doesn’t appear to have a special name – it’s just shown as the regular advance purchase rate:
Here are some (good) rates that I’ve found:
- Crowne Plaza London – City £78
- Crowne Plaza London – Kensington £69
- Hotel Indigo London – Kensington £65
- InterContinental London O2 £117
- Hotel Indigo Edinburgh £67
- Kimpton Clocktower Hotel Manchester £79
- Crowne Plaza Manchester City Centre £44
- InterContinental Berlin €88
- Hotel Indigo Berlin – Ku’damm €59
- Crowne Plaza Frankfurt Congress Hotel €45
- Crowne Plaza Rome – St. Peter’s €88
- Hotel Indigo Milan – Corso Monforte €114
Beware that full payment is taken at the time of booking (although it may not be the case in practice), and two weeks’ notice for cancellation isn’t really generous. Due to the current IHG waiver though, you are free to cancel your booking as long as the stay is before 30 September, and hopefully it gets extended.