Hotel Churn

[kevin_standlee]

IHG is running a promotion that I wish had started a week earlier than it did (it didn't begin until September 1), and to earn one of the bonuses in it, I need to stay in three IHG brand hotels. I already have Holiday Inn Express and Intercontinental (the Venetian, which they still haven't credited to my account, but I have to wait four weeks before I say anything), and so today I moved for one night to the Holiday Inn on North First Street in San Jose. This is the hotel that I personally think of as the Le Baron, an early home of Timecon, when I first started doing the convention thing in the 1980s. The last time I set foot in this hotel, the desk clerk who checked me in hadn't even been born.

This isn't the worn-out hotel down near the freeway currently bearing the name "San Jose Airport Garden Hotel," that has had a number of different brands and was a Holiday Inn when we used it for one of the ConStruction local-focused conrunning conventions a few years ago. It was the "overflow Hyatt" into which some ConJosé members were shuffled with the then-Hyatt downtown goofed and double-booked a bunch of its rooms. It appears that this hotel is doomed; there's a redevelopment sign in front of it that suggests it will soon be leveled for new construction. I don't think any of us who know the property will miss it.

Another nearby hotel has been de-flagged. The Radisson San Jose, which was adjacent to the apartments in which I stayed for a year and in which I rented one of their parking spaces in their garage, has become the "San Jose Airport Hotel" (not to be confused with the "San Jose Airport Garden Hotel" around the corner from it.

Anyway, back to the Holiday Inn. I was "upgraded" to the top floor, but the VIP lounge doesn't seem to run on weekends. As usual, I tend to think about what sorts of conventions I could hold in a given property. This one looks like it would actually be pretty good for SMOFCon or other 100-person event, particularly if we were allowed to take over the top-floor VIP lounge as our Con Suite for the weekend. Not that I'm actually bidding for anything, you understand.

I went to Fremont today and took care of some miscellaneous errands there, but my more ambitious plans were washed out by the rain that moved through the area today, and so instead I headed back to the hotel. That means that to move between hotels a long block apart, I drove about 36 miles back and forth to Fremont. Tomorrow won't be quite as bad, but I still have things to do. That's probably just as well as I'll need to find something to do with myself between check-out from the Holiday Inn and check-in to the Vagabond Inn.

Comments

[twilight2000.livejournal.com]

Having recently done the "take over the VIP for con suite" thing - it's a little on the expensive side - and you want to make sure they let you at the kitchen. We moved loads of furniture around and they gave us use of one of the smaller fridges - it worked and was very nice, but there are issues ;>

[ceemage.livejournal.com]

I hereby dub the inability to avoid looking at any hotel and immediately decide what kind of SF con would fit in there as "Former Worldcon Chair Disease." Or, if you prefer "Standlee Syndrome"...

[jcfiala.livejournal.com]

Eh, I've never been in charge of anything larger than the rpg gaming at a gaming con, but I still do that. Although I probably don't do as good an assessment as folks who've seen the whole banana.

[querldox.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure, but the redevelopment may be the move of Bay 101 to that side of 101. It's planning to move over there very close to M8trix, and attach a hotel to itself and the like.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

Based on the description on the redevelopment sign, that is what it must be, there being only two licensed card-rooms in San Jose.