ORD to Anywhere

My stay at the Westin Grand Munich wasn’t intentional. When I was planning this entire trip I was much more focused on securing hotels for my stops in Berlin and Budapest than anything remotely related to Munich. In retrospect I believe it was because I simply wasn’t that interested in Munich as a destination and that quickly translated into general apathy regarding anything on that leg of the trip. In the end all I wanted was a comfortable hotel for the three days I’d be e

Unfortunately I lost about half of my stash of photos for this hotel stay, so it’s going to be pretty short and sweet. This was the last hotel on a fairly epic journey that started in New York City and took me through Tokyo, Frankfurt, Budapest, Munich, and Berlin. I needed a place to stay overnight between the Lufthansa economy class leg from Munich and my departure on AirBerlin back to the US of A. Since I was traveling on separate tickets I figured it was safest to give

Flying with American Airlines to anywhere other than Asia, South America or the South Pacific, you're likely to either be put on an itinerary or at a minimum be offered one flying to London Heathrow (LHR) for an onward connection. This has been the case for many of my travels around the world, making my way across the globe through London's most massive air complex. Many of those times I simply would spend my time wandering the terminals and enjoying the beautiful accents a

When it comes to air travel, people know where my loyalties lie. Hotel brand are a bit of a different story though. The benefits of hotel loyalty simply don’t fit very well with my travel goals and style, which means I’m much more likely to “sleep around” at various chain and non-chain properties over the course of a year. I’m certainly a member of several hotel loyalty programs because if you’re going to stay at one there’s no reason not to collect the points, but I don’t

If you take a quick look back at all the hotel reviews I’ve done, you’ll notice that I seem to have a bit of sweet spot for Best Western. It’s a bit odd in some respects I suppose. Most people who take the time to provide hotel reviews tend to focus on higher end properties – the Four Seasons, Park Hyatts, Aman resorts, etc. I’m not exactly a man of means though, so while I treat myself to the occasional luxury property, the Best Western is more often where I end up stayin