travelsavant

Lucky: Your new trip report is great; thanks for all the details & photos.
For the SF DO, put me down as definite.

Heads up to CA Residents: new IC on Howard has a special "CA Staycation" offer, with rooms starting at $189, + almost $100 in freebies: free parking + breakfast for 2 @Luce + $20 gas card! You have to call to book offer 866-781-2364; rate is good for "DO" weekend (I just checked & booked). Must show CA ID at check-in.

lucky9876coins

I've put you down for the Do and also for the IC. Look forward to seeing you there.

That's a great rate, btw!

UA_Flyer

Wow, I just found this thread!

Put me down as a strong may be for this DO, and a stay at the InterContinental.

I will try to see what I need to do to get September 26 off, and find a good fare out NYC on Thusday redeye or Friday morning on UA.

lucky9876coins

Would be great to finally meet you, UA_Flyer! I've put you down for both the Do and the IC.

lucky9876coins

OK folks, some slight changes.

First of all, I've faxed the contracts to both restaurant so we're good to go.

For Friday night we're still doing Buca (which is just too good of a location/deal to pass up). The menu can be found here. We're going with the Classico option. For now I've made the following selections:
Soft drinks are also included and it's all you can eat, so if there's something you don't like you can just have more of something else.

Also, feel free to suggest any amendments to the menu, but please base them off of more than just personal preference. Like I said the selections are tentative.

We've also switched the restaurant for Saturday. They wanted a hefty deposit and it got to the point where we just got a bit annoyed at the fact that they seem to be basically the only restaurant in SF that wants a deposit so far out. We've now switched dinner for Saturday to Restaurant LuLu, which has gotten excellent reviews based on what I've seen. There are more details in the OP.

I promise we're getting there, and Wireless has promised to have registration open by the end of the week (if not feel free to bombard his inbox, seriously).

Thanks for being patient.

work2fly

sounds good lucky! Thanks for all of your work on this ^

LuLu can be very nice for a group dinner...though I've never been there with more than 25-30 people

Daringdoo

Just tried to book the $189 Staycation - it's now $249! Apparently it was an introductory rate and is now gone

travelsavant

Daringdoo: sorry, but I thought they told me yesterday that the "Staycation" package was good through end of September. Or did you mean package is now $249?

jmsoros

Lucky,
Everything sounds great and I've been to Lulu and it's very good. Thanks for doing all this work!
Julie

peteropny

With the changes - maybe we can just bill this as the Folsom Do - since its centered around the area that weekend

Daringdoo

The cost is now $249. They still have the 'Staycation' but it's no longer $189

I'm a little peeved actually. I had been calling IC off and on for weeks now and they never mentioned this special. Apparently it's my fault because I didn't ask for it by name (I didn't even know about it to ask for it!) Since this package included parking, it was more valuable to me than the other special (bogo) other FTers are booking. I don't need an extra night but I do need parking - and I'm not prepared to pay $50+ for it. Grrr.

DD

Pat89339

You might want to check with other hotels nearby to see if they are offering a Staycation with parking.

Daringdoo

Yeah... Once I discovered such an animal existed, I did just that. No luck... yet. I haven't given up - I'll continue to check; as we all know, hotel rates change like the wind (or, like airfares)!

DD

bobsgt

Ok- call me crazy (Crowd: YOU'RE CRAZY!) but we chose the W Silicon Valley after reviewing all of our options. Bonus SPG points, acceptable reviews from FT'ers, and 5 miles from a BART station so we don't have to drive in SF.

Already had great interaction by email with the hotel staff- and $287ai for 3 days was a very happy rate 9/25-9/28. And now I can use an addfare machine to stack all the $2 balance BART cards we have left over from previous trips^

This should be a great DO, Lucky! Thanks for putting it together.

RichardInSF

There is nowhere in Silicon Valley that is within 5 miles of a BART station! In fact, this hotel is on the wrong side of the bay to be in Silicon Valley and it is rather a long ride to/from SF on BART, looks like 50-55 minutes each way. The room price is certainly cheap, but is it still cheap if you add in a rental car (which you'll want to go to/from the hotel as well as for local transportation)? That wouldn't be required if you stayed in SF.