February Travels - Part 2

My other trip in February was at the end of the month and I headed up to Townsville for the weekend.

I'm a member of Accor's Advantage Plus program so I stayed at the new(ish) Grand Mercure Townsville using a free night I had up my sleeve and a member's discounted rate on the other. I also decided to upgrade to a one bedroom apartment rather than a studio.

The hotel is in a great location in Townsville, right in the middle of Palmer Street which is a strip of restaurants and cafe's. The apartment itself was a good size, separate bedroom from the lounge room (pictured below) and perfect for a couple of nights stay.

For the foodies, the culinary highlight of the weekend was dinner on Saturday night at The Saltcellar. I can't remember the cut of beef (eye fillet or angus fillet) but it was quality!

February travels - part 1

Despite it being one of the busier months of the year for us, I managed to get away a couple of times during February. First off was a long weekend in the Hunter Valley with some friends. We flew down early Saturday morning and came back on Monday evening, thankfully Adam was able to look after things while I was away.

My friends had actually already organised the accommodation but with my experience I was able to find a slightly better deal, saving us $100 per apartment over the two nights. We stayed at Grand Mercure The Vintage which is part of the Greg Norman designed golf course. It was perfect for our group and we shared 2 two bedroom apartments.

Last time I went to the Hunter was about 6 years ago for a friend's wedding and the challenge then was finding something suitable for more than 2 people. The Grand Mercure certainly solves that problem. The townhouses (pictured below) are essentially a 2 bedroom apartment on the ground floor and another 2 bedroom apartment above, perfect for the 7 of us. The bedrooms were a good size, the bathrooms were great (separate shower and large bath tub) and the living area was spacious.

From a wine tour perspective, the highlight of the weekend was tasting the Brokenwood Graveyard Shiraz and from a food perspective lunch at Margan Restaurant. The triple-cooked pork cheek with scallops was one of the best meals I've had in a long time!

Capital Reservations' theme song!

If you've ever listened to the music playing in the background of our office, you'll know we listen to Triple J (Renee would be proud). In between the hundreds of phone calls this week, Adam brought to my attention the song below and after hearing it for myself, I'm now naming it our theme song!

Why "Jump in to the fog" by The Wombats? The opening line is:
"What a great achievement it was to get a hotel room this late"
Which is pretty much what we do all day every day!

How to watch the big game

With the Super Bowl just a couple of days away now, I came across this article about the ultimate hotel package if you can't make it to the game itself.

$42,650 Super Bowl Hotel Suite - AOL Travel News

Super Bowl fever can take many forms, but for those with a taste for luxury, watching the big game in a suite priced at $42,650 at the Mandarin Oriental New York might just be the ticket.

The over-the-top package includes a night in the Presidential suite, a three-course catered meal for 15 during the game and a very rare bottle of 50-year-old Scotch.

The hotel's Director of Communications Tammy Peters confirmed to AOL Travel News that as of Wednesday the Presidential suite was still available.

'We've done it [a special Super Bowl package] a few years in a row,' says Peters. 'Sometimes it sells and sometimes it doesn't.'

Whether you are rooting for the Pittsburg Steelers or the Green Bay Packers, you'll be watching on a 65-inch plasma screen television with eight surround speakers and noshing on mini Kobe beef burgers and Ahi tuna tacos.

The bulk of the cost of the room comes from the Glenfiddich 50 Year Old. The hotel has one of only five bottles available in North America.

Just how much is it worth? One recently sold at auction for $38,000.


For more details on the hotel, click here.

Welcome back Adam!

When the GFC hit, Adam (our office manager) went to work for a friend of mine's company that wasn't affected by the economic slowdown. Is it was a secondment type arrangement in that the idea was always for him to return to Capital Reservations as things got back to normal for us. I'm pleased to say that after a good 2010, especially the end of it, Adam is back in the office (after a little over 18 months away) and ready for a big 2011.

A number of the agents who have been using us for a while will remember working with him, for those that haven't, please be patient as he might just take a little time to find his feet again.

2010 by the numbers

At the start of each year, I sit down and work out our sales productions for hotels for the calendar year just gone. I didn't do it in 2009 because, well the numbers took such a dive from 2008 and 2007 due to the GFC/economic slowdown that it just didn't seem worthwhile. So back in 2008 I compared production to 2007 for each city but since I've skipped a year, I won't worry about doing that this time. This year (2011) it will certainly be interesting to compare against the 2010 numbers.

Anyway, here is a list of the capital cities and which were the most productive for us (from best to worst):

1. Darwin
2. Brisbane
3. Perth
4. Sydney
5. Adelaide
6. Canberra
7. Melbourne

Apologies to our friends in Tasmania, but we did hardly any room nights in Hobart so I don't have them on the list. 2010 was the first year that our home town of Brisbane wasn't our biggest city. Thanks to a very large client that we look after, Darwin was the big mover on the list and sales were substantially ahead of Brisbane in second. Melbourne has really dropped off for us over the last few years and has now fallen to the bottom.

Thanks to the aformentioned large client, our top 2 hotels in the country are in Darwin. Here is the list of the 10 hotels around Australia that we make the most bookings with:

1. Mantra Pandanas (Darwin)
2. Mantra on the Esplanade (Darwin)
3. Mantra on Hay (Perth)
4. Oaks Charlotte Towers (Brisbane)
5. Mantra on Northbourne (Canberra)
6. Chifley at Lennons (Brisbane)
7. M on Mary (Brisbane)
8. Aarons All-Suites (Perth)
9. Citigate & Sebel King George Square (Brisbane)
10. The Portal Hotel (Brisbane)

Mantra Pandanas exterior

Brisbane hotel flood update

More on the Queensland flood situation next time, but quickly here are the main Brisbane hotels that have been affected:

Stamford Plaza - closed until further notice, they're hoping February some time (I heard yesterday they were out for at least 6 weeks)

Rydges South Bank - no power, running off a generator. Hoping to have power back on in the next few days

Quay West Suites - no power, operating on limited services. No new arrivals until January 20.

The Sebel Suites - closed until February 7

Oaks 212 Margaret - no power, not accommodating guests until January 22

Oaks Festival Towers - limited lifts in service

Central West End Apartments - no power, unlikely to be operating for at least 4 weeks.