Top ten alternative lodging options

by Katie Hammel on
When it comes to lodging, most people automatically look for a hotel. And if you want room service, a business center, gym, and all the other perks that come with a hotel, that may be your best bet. But if you’re looking for a more unique place to stay, if you want to save money, or if you want to experience a destination in an entirely new way, you have a whole range of options outside the sphere of Marriotts, Hiltons, and Four Seasons. Here are the top ten alternative lodging options.
Bed and Breakfasts/Guesthouses
A bed and breakfast (which in some countries, goes by the name guesthouse) is always my first choice for accommodation. Do I have a deep-seeded fetish for doilies, furniture that looks like it belongs in my grandma’s house, and forced interaction over tea and scones? Definitely not. Luckily, not all B&Bs fit that stereotype. Many offer chic, modern décor and accommodations that are just as luxurious and stylish as their hotel counterparts.

The reason I choose these types of bed and breakfasts is this: generally, as it’s a small business, the owners are very hands on and present. You don’t feel so much like another anonymous customer as a welcomed guest. At bed and breakfasts I’ve stayed at, the hosts have been more than happy to sit down and give me personalized recommendations for the city I was visiting, to offer champagne toasts on New Year’s Eve, and even to provide me with a ride to the airport when my cab didn’t show up on time.

Bed and breakfasts tend to be located in more residential areas of a city, which means that you can better imagine what life is like for those who live here, you see a different side of the city, and best of all, rates are often much lower than the average hotel. Plus, the included breakfast means you save even more.

Boutique Hotel/Inn
Boutique hotels and inns are often very similar to a bed and breakfast. They may not go by the name because they don’t want to be associated with the stuffy Victorian image of other B&Bs or perhaps they aren’t truly a B&B if they don’t serve breakfast. Many are more of a hybrid between B&B and hotel. Thanks to their small size, they may offer the personalized service of a bed and breakfast, but with some of the amenities that you’d find in a hotel. Every boutique hotel I have ever stayed in has offered free wi-fi and many have had small lounges for afternoon drinks or snacks.

Hostel
Maybe your days of sleeping in bunk accommodations with young, unwashed travelers are long gone. You’d never even think about staying in a hostel again. But if you are a budget traveler, you may want to reconsider that position. Many hostels offer private double rooms (with shared or private baths) in addition to dorm style accommodations. Actually, several that I have stayed at in the last year have only had private rooms and the shared bathrooms, while located next door to the room, were only shared between 2-3 rooms and were single-stall locking bathrooms. Sure, you still have to go down the hall to use the loo, but for a traveler on a budget, saving $10-$20 per night in exchange for doing so may be worth it.

At every hostel I have stayed at, I never had to wait for the bathroom, the other travelers were older budget travelers like myself, internet was free, and every few rooms shared a small kitchenette, which meant I could save even more money by cooking lunch or dinner in the hostel a few times. And again, the hostel prices were significantly cheaper than comparable hotels.

Apartments/Cabins
If you’re planning an extended stay in one location, or are traveling with kids or a few friends, an apartment or cabin rental can really make financial sense. It may cost a bit more than a hotel, but the money you’ll save being able to cook your own meals, enjoy a few drinks in your living room, or wash your clothes in your own laundry machine, may offset any extra expensive. And if you have a few friends to split the cost with, you can save big.

Camping
When I think of camping, I think of packing a tent and a cooler and heading “up north” with friends. Or at least, that’s what I used to think of. Now I’ve learned that you can camp just about anywhere – in the US, Asia, Africa, and even just outside of Europe’s biggest cities.
Camping doesn’t have to mean roughing it either. Many European campsites, for example, are located 15-20 minutes by bus outside of the city center and offer dining halls, internet access, swimming pools, and modern bathrooms. In Africa, if you can’t quite afford a $500 per night luxury lodge, just buy a tent when you arrive, drive to the game park, and pick one of the many available camps where you can score a spot for about $20 per night, eating in the camp’s dining hall and relaxing in the communal swimming pool.

Agritourismos/Farm Stays
When visiting a city, I generally like to stay in the city. I want to be able to step outside of my lodging directly into the fray. I want to wander all day down cobble stones streets, and then be able to totter home after a few drinks to fall asleep to the sounds of the city. But in some areas, the way of life is more rural. In these places, I want to get the full experience. Here, I want to look out my window and see rolling fields. I want to see how the people live off the land, and I want to retire each night to watch the sunset from my deck while eating food produced just a few steps from where I’m standing. In these places, I want to stay at an agritourismo.

Like a bed and breakfast, and agritourismo is family run and generally offers breakfast included in the accommodation. But an agritourismo or farm stay also offers much more. Guest will get an education in farming while immersing themselves in nature – horseback riding, wandering through fields, and learning about (or even helping with) the operations of the property.
Servas
Servas is an “international, nonprofit organization that provides opportunities for personal contact between people of diverse backgrounds. Members need to apply and pay a membership fee so there is a bit more investment required that with CouchSurfing, and the emphasis on cultural connection is even higher. Both hosts and travelers need to be interviews by a local coordinator in order to be accepted, and have a certain degree of responsibility once they become members.
Hosts welcome guests for one or two nights, and offer some kind of cultural exchange during the process. They are expected to spend time with guests and invite them to share an evening meal. Guests are expected to view the host site as more than just a place to stay. Then interview process and application fees for joining may help set some hesitant members’ minds at ease and people who aren’t quite comfortable with CouchSurfing may be more inclined to try Servas.
AirBNB
A cross between CouchSurfing and a guesthouse, AirBNB is a service that connects hosts – those with a space room or sometimes just a spare couch – with a guest in need of a place to stay. The catch is that unlike CouchSurfing, guests have to pay for rooms booked through AirBNB. Where CouchSurfing is more about community and cultural exchange, AirBNB is more about commerce.

But, many of the AirBNB listings are more than just offers for a couch. Dozens are listings for entire apartments, often at rates much lower than what you would pay for a hotel. The site has more comprehensive offering for big cities than small towns, especially in the US, so while you might score a pretty great deal for someone’s pied a terre in NYC or Chicago, you may have a harder time finding an apartment rental in Tuscany or Bavaria.
Homeswaps
Homeswapping requires a degree of flexibility, but the rewards can be great. Here’s how it works. You sign up on a homeswapping website like Home Exchange, pay your annual fee (usually under $50) and then list your house or apartment. You can wait for the requests to come in and respond according to your schedule, or you can approach others for a swap based on your travel plans.

Say you’re looking to plan a trip to Paris this summer. You check out the available houses in the city and begin sending inquiries to the owners asking about your preferred week. One couple may have a house available, and have an interest in coming to visit the city where you live, but they might not be able to travel on that exact week, so you work together and come up with dates that are convenient for both of you.

Most successful homeswappers live in a city that is more popular. For example, it might be harder to find someone from Paris who is interested in traveling to Cincinnati, Ohio, than New York City.
CouchSurfing
The most famous of all free accommodation, CouchSurfing is a million-member strong community of travelers. Some are offering places to stay, others are looking for a host to take them in on their travels. You post a profile and it’s up to you to decide who to host (or if you want to host at all) and who you feel comfortable staying with. Members span all walks of life, but they all seem to have one thing in common – a desire to see the world and travel cheaply, and to connect with other like-minded people while they do so.

Many hosts and surfers make a point to get together during the hosting period. When I stayed with a couple in Austin, Texas, last year, we all went out for dinner one night. We had a great time and they ended dup showing me a side of the city I never would have discovered on my own. Some people are uncomfortable with the idea of staying in a stranger’s house. And if you’re looking just to relax and escape this might not be the ideal situation. But if you want to connect with another culture and see a place from an insider’s point of view, give CouchSurfing a try.

Hostel Trail: Latin America’s hostel network

by Brenda Yun on

I think long and hard about what kind of cool, helpful knowledge I might be able to share with Gadling readers, and sometimes the most obvious material escapes me. But it only took me a few months to realize I’ve been keeping my best tips to myself because I don’t see them as suggestions, but rather as experiences.

I stepped foot in the Hostel Trail guesthouse in Popayán, Colombia by default. I hadn’t even intended to pass through the “white city” (it’s known as this because all of the buildings in the historical center of the city are a beautiful, uniform, stark white color). In fact, I only planned on being in Colombia for five weeks — not twice that long, as my stay there turned out to be. My five days in Popayán were so comfortable because Hostel Trail is one of the cleanest and most reasonably-priced guesthouses I’ve stayed in all my travels around Latin America (and, believe me, I’ve seen some pretty decripit places).
Tony and Kim, the Irish owners of Hostel Trail, realized the fantastic potential of Popayán as a travel destination (it was recently named of the gastronomical centers in Latin America — and rightly so!). They quickly made this place (at the edge of the old city) their home and have been sharing it with backpackers for about two years. Using their technological savvy, as well as their connections in Colombia and Latin America, they decided to utilize their innovative web domain as a homepage for not only their hostel but all of the cool hostels in Latin America. Tony and Kim continue to spend long hours networking with other hostels in South and Central America. Once part of the network, a hostel is given a whole page dedicated to information about their lodging. Ultimately, HostelTrail.com is truly the most viable lodging resource for backpackers in Latin America.

There are now hundreds of hostels in the Hostel Trail network, making it that much easier to travel from city to city because you know what to expect when you get to your next hostel. What’s even cooler about Hostel Trail is if you’re on a tight budget and have a way with words and a camera, you can actually write for Hostel Trail and get free lodging wherever it is you stay — so long as it is not a place that is already covered on the site, and you provide a comprehensive overview of the hostel, along with photos of the place for other travelers to see.

How have I waited this long to reveal one of my best kept Latin American secrets? I guess it’s been nearly a year since I stepped foot in Latin America, so I kept my memories tightly locked in the recesses of my mind so as to avoid the painful nostalgia I feel for this part of the world. Regardless, the Hostel Trail guesthouse in Popayán, its hostel network, and the travel writing opportunity with the site makes HostelTrail.com one of the best resources for travel not only in Colombia, but all over Latin America. If you do make it to Popayán, please tell Tony, Kim, and their cute little black dog I say “aloha!”
[Yes, that’s me in the photo, enjoying Poker beer and a ride on a Chiva, taking in the Popayán nightlife!]

Planning a trip to a National Park? Book campsites and rooms now.

by Jamie Rhein on

Although taking that summer road trip may be far from your mind, if you’re thinking of a stay at a national park, make reservations now. Lodges, cabins and campsites fill up fast, but can be booked up to six months in advance.

A few years ago, we stayed in a Rough Rider cabin near the Roosevelt Lodge at Yellowstone National Park in June and booked it in January. The advantage to planning ahead is that knowing where you need to be, at least part of the summer, helps organize the rest of it. From Yellowstone, we headed to Pocatello, Idaho through Utah, on to California and back to Ohio through New Mexico visiting friends and family along the way.

If you want to hook a vacation around Yellowstone, there are several lodging options in and around the park. This link lists many of them.

If you’re interested in camping–or renting a cabin, head to recreation.gov where there is a drop down menu that lists campground and cabin options. RV camp sites are included. You can book online by using the date function.

If you’re thinking of a Rough Rider cabin, know that they don’t come with a bathroom. There is a communal facility with toilets and showers.For us, it was a perfect stay and the price was right. We ate breakfast in the Roosevelt Lodge’s dining room. There are other more expensive cabins located elsewhere that do have a bathroom if that’s your preference. The photo is of the inside of a Rough Rider cabin.

To book one of these rooms or lodge rooms or cabins at some of the other national and state parks, go to Xanterra Parks & Resorts. There are availabilities, but some lodges have filled up.

Craigslist Provides Different Avenue for Booking Accommodations

by Catherine Bodry on

I’m a daydreamer, and my favorite daydreams always include traveling. When I lived in a town with a bookstore, I loved to spend a rainy afternoon there with a guidebook. I’d pick a random place, like Fiji or South Korea, and research what transportation I’d take from the airport. Then I’d examine the hostels and pick one within my budget that was centrally located. After spending a couple of hours with the guidebook, I’d go home and look up photos of the destinations on the internet. Finally, I’d research flights, picking when I thought was the best time to go. When I was finished I loved thinking, “Today I went to South Korea.” It was always satisfying and stimulating to daydream a possible trip.

Now that I don’t live in a town with a bookstore, I’ve satisfied my daydreams by doing all my planning online. In the process, I’ve discovered that Craigslist.org is an excellent location for finding possible accommodation. Almost every country is represented, but Europe has the most representation outside the U.S. Check out some of my findings today: There’s this apartment in Paris. Also this one in Florence. In Tuscany there’s this farmhouse. And these examples are just a small sampling of what you can find on Craigslist. I’ve already got a fake surprise weekend in Provence planned for me and my husband.

So what exactly is Craigslist.org? It’s a free (except for job postings in 7 U.S. cities) online text-based classified forum, started by a San Franciscan (named Craig!). Users self-publish and self-regulate, which means that improper posts or known scams can be “flagged” for removal. This community moderation ought to add some security to anyone booking vacation lodging online, but it seems as though there’s probably a risk of misrepresentation at the least and outright theft at the worst.

I haven’t used Craigslist to book accommodation. But I’m curious, so I’ll put it out to you readers: has anyone booked vacation rentals through Craigslist? What was your experience? Post a comment and let us know!

Chile’s Elqui Domos, Astronomic Hotel

by Adrienne Wilson on



Cool? Extremely! One of the seven astronomic hotels and the only in the southern hemisphere, this lodging jewel found in Chile is called Elquis Domos. (I discovered this one via The Cool Hunter, who I must say is doing a great job living up to the name.)

Elquis Domos pretends to be a magical place according to the story found on the hotel’s main webpage. The 6 geodesic domes are two-stories: the first floor houses the living room and bathroom and the second story has the main bed and a detachable roof. Other amenities/features include terrace space, telescopes, and specialized astronomic literature. Dark nights and bright stars are the real experience when staying in the Elqui Valley so it really is only appropriate to have offer accommodation that is both unique and allows the visitor to stargaze from their very own bed.

Just when I thought the Elquis Domos was going to throw out some ridiculously inflated rates I opened my eyes to a big surprise. They’re actually mid-range and affordable. During low season you’re in starting at $72 and during the high season for $99. Not bad.
If you want additional services like an astronomic tour or nighttime horse ride it’ll cost you extra, but if you’re looking for a room I’d have to say it couldn’t get better than this.

I’m so there and it will be sooner rather than later!