It has been a few years since we have traveled to France using Rick's book most of the time for hotels. In past years Rick didn't make reservations for the hotels. His book now says to make reservations. We like the 2-3 star places and will be going there in Sept. I plan to make reservations the first night.
Do you think it is necessary to make reservations well ahead of arrival? (excluding Paris).
Thanks, Karen
I personally think you can still do it and we do so from time to time. However, since the internet has make advance reservations very, very easy and most people like certainity the rate of advance reservations has increased substantially. Also, am seeing the rise of discount rates for advance reservations which puts more pressure on reservations. I can only relate our experience. We were in southern Spain over after Christmas and over New Years --- Madrid, Seville, Granada. Because we needed two rooms and it was a quick trip -- ten days -- we reserved everything in advance. All the hotels were in Steves' Spanish book. On checking in I asked each hotel if they still had rooms available. Only the hotel in Seville over New Years eve and day was full. This past Fall we spent mid-Sept to mid-Oct in Europe and always found rooms when we needed them. We did notice that the very small places - less than ten rooms with great descriptions -- were often full.
You might try a mix and see how much has changed since the last time you were in France.
If you're sure of your itinerary, it's hard to think of a reason NOT to make reservations.
Arguments for making reservations:
If choice is limited at your destinations
If you are in any way choosy
If you are traveling in season
The more of these apply to your trip, the stronger the argument for reserving far in advance (as opposed to day before or morning of).
I suspect Rick has changed his recommendation to reflect changes in his readers (older, more affluent, less flexible), not in Europe hotels.
I like to make reservations for these reasons:
Make all reservations for sure. Sept is still busy and RS hotel recom are more popular than ever. Rick has done such a good job that his recom fill up fast thru Fall. If you don't you will be spending alot of time looking for your lodging.
Been using RS recommendations since yr 2000.
I think it depends on when you travel (the previous note about traveling in season I think is pertinent). We just finished making hotel reservations for our trip in early July -- there were several hotels where we were told that they had NO availability for the dates we were going to be there (specifically in Arles). We got some other reservations where we were told we had the last available room. Whew! I guess it depends on how flexible you are and if you are willing to stay somewhere else than you had originally intended.
Anton
Thanks for all the information about making hotel reservations.
I am now looking into reserving hotels. First hotel has a room but needs my credit card to hold it and doesn't have a secured web page. Rick's book says to call,fax or send credit card split in in two emails. How did you handle this part?
I checked with Staples and they don't have an International number for fax. I found I could pay Verizon a small fee per month plus .07/min. for International calling. Not very comfortable about sending my cc via email.
Karen
