Starwood Preferred Guest - Cash and Points at the Westin Palace Madrid v. Park Hyatt Villa Magna?

I'll be in Madrid in the first wk. of July and I'm trying to decide between using the cash and points at the Westin Palace or using my Hyatt points at the Park Hyatt Villa Magna. There are four of us going, adults, so we'll need two rooms at either property, for three nights.

Both seem like great hotels, though the Hyatt has a consistency in the high ratings that the Palace doesn't seem to have. Frankly, though, the Palace is more appealing in terms of location and general impression I think it will create on my travelling companions.

First of all, with the going lowest rate at 225 Euros, cash and points for 4K + $60 seems like a good deal to me. Am I right in thinking this? I only have 65K pts. in the SPG program, so it's more appealing for me to spend 24K and $360 than burn all 60K Points.

Second this also seems like a better deal to me than using 90K Hyatt points for the three nights (2 rooms at 15K/night each)-- I have over 400K Hyatt points, but I don't want a quarter of them to disappear for a 3-night stay, esp. as I don't think this is one of Hyatt's premier properties--would rather save the nights for Paris or Tokyo or Hawaii.

The one disadvantage of the Westin is that we won't get any breakfast (even as a SPG Plat), but at the Hyatt, I'm guaranteed a free breakfast as a Diamond.

For those who understand the two programs, I'd welcome any thoughts on my analysis...

I'm posting in the Starwood forum because I need more advice thinking from the Starwood side as I don't quite understand the program as well. I'll cross-post to Hyatt once there's some feedback here.

Thanks!

The Westin has a little nicer lobby and rooms
As long as you get one thats been renovated
The Hyatt as you also stated is also a nice hotel and I found the conceirge to be more helpful and friendly
There was a problem at the Westin Palace with an absurdly rude and nasty conceirge.
It is something I have never witnessed anywhere else in the world prior.
Especially in such a nice hotel.
A little attitude would have been welcome in comparison
I found all other staff to be exceptional for the most part
Incidently the conceirge was nice enough to apologize after the issue and concern was brought to managements attention.
And he did seem sincere.
Perhaps wanting to keep his job http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif
And all is forgiven for the most part
Enjoy where ever you decide to stay !
The Palace lobby is a must to see even if you do not end up staying. Very impresive

------------------
AA & Starwood,Marriott Platinum
Hyatt, Hilton Diamond
Swissotel Club Gold
U/A 1k

I would go for the Palace without hesitation. Its location is unbeatable (Hyatt would only be better if your main concern is shopping), it is a great hotel, with heavenly beds, and very good service. Being a Starwood top property, you can be sure that customer satisfaction is quite important there.

As a hotel, the Villa Magna seems to have a slightly higher reputattion. As to points used, Palace is the better deal, IMHO.

Plus, you need to consider location: Villa Magna is in a newer part of town, with the main shopping street - Serrano - close by, and within a walkable distance to the Ritiero - big park area.
Palace is more old town, lots of bars, retaurants, less business like surroundings.

Brekfast: Villa Magna has a nice Starbucks around the corner, plus in both places if you do not need the big breakfast, there are scores of afes and bars around, where you have a cortado or cafe con leche and s.th. to eat for a fraction of hotel breakfast prices.

Hotel istelf: Palace, unless you like more modern buildings.

[This message has been edited by NorthernAtlanticRacer (edited 04-09-2003).]

Funny kv99 we have the same dilemma !

I will be staying in MAD in late May. After much thought I decided to stay with the Hyatt. I've got a room on the Regency floor and that played a big part. Also I booked this award stay a looooong time ago, before the big increase in the award charts so it was much less in points.

I'll let you know what it was like when I get back.

I just completed a four day FFN stay at the Villa Magna. I liked it but received no real upgrade and no other recognition as a diamond other than breakfast and a nice room. The person checking me in was not very friendly and rather blase. It didn't improve much during the stay. Our amenity was never delivered, which I found odd. It was supposed to be delivered, but someone dropped the ball.

The hotel is very nice, but in a sort of sedate part of town. You need to bus to get down to the touristy areas, so you need to plan your days based on that. On the other hand, it was very quiet. There is a great open air sculpture park very close to the hotel and the paseo de castellena is a very interesting street.

Great shopping around that area can be found, its just sort of pricey. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

We went into the Westin Palace to check it out. It seemed very nice and much closer to the museums.

Next time, I would probably opt for the Palace so that I could spend more time walking around and less time on public transport.

lala

Thanks for the feedback everyone-- I'm leaning towards the Palace as well for many of the reasons mentioned above...appreciate the thoughts.

sunil--

Two things:

* There's no Regency Club at the Hyatt Villa Magna, so not sure what sort of accomodation you've reserved w/your points. You will definitely get breakfast if you're Diamond, but otherwise possibly not.

* I thought the Hyatt point structure changed quite a while ago. When did you reserve this?

Let us know how your stay is (on the Hyatt board!)

Karthik

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by kv99:


sunil--

Two things:

* There's no Regency Club at the Hyatt Villa Magna, so not sure what sort of accomodation you've reserved w/your points. You will definitely get breakfast if you're Diamond, but otherwise possibly not.

* I thought the Hyatt point structure changed quite a while ago. When did you reserve this?

Let us know how your stay is (on the Hyatt board!)

Karthik</font>

sigh.. Thanks Karthik, I find out now that the Park Hyatt in MAD does not have a RC. Not sure what to do, it wasn't alot of extra points in the old award chart. It does annoy me that they never mentioned this at the time of rsv.

The award chart changed ages ago, but Hyatt let members book and change the dates on the rsv. I think it was 8K in points under the old award chart as compared to 15K now !

Sorry to go off-topic and off-Starwood, but I can't believe I didn't know that you could book and change dates on the old Hyatt awards--I'd have blocked 100 nights at the Park Tokyo, Kauai, Paris, and Grand Hong Kong http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif. Still, you're getting a deal, right, evne at the higher RC level? And you can always try demanding a breakfast (if you're not a Diamond), and some free drinks at night.

Have stayed at Villa Magna, Ritz and visited the Palace. Did this at a time when I was unconcerned a about points. All things considered: Ritz was quite elegant but disappointing. Villa Magna had beautifully-appointed rooms and outstanding service & the price for breakfast was insane (so, if breakfast is included, you are way-ahead). Palace seemed to have a lot of guests with name-tags and the hotel is in a good location. IMHO, it is really not better-located than Villa Magna. I would return to Villa Magna in a heartbeat, but not the others.