boolean64

In the last three months I've had successful one night stays at both the W (mid-week) and the StR (Saturday).

silentbob1974

Thanks, your descriptions of both were dead-on. Because the Astor Suite was booked for our third night in SF, I gambled by splitting the reservation and ended up having all my SNAs clear, two nights at the St. Regis then one at the W. Worth moving all our luggage down the street, as it was literally one block away. I really liked the layout of things in the Fantastic Suite, and especially the great panoramic city views. That said, the St. Regis treated us really well, and even gave a gift bag of toys for our son! But I think for any future stays downtown, the W will be our first choice.

bgriff

Thanks, have heard great things about the StR across all of the forums...unfortunately it is usually outside both my cash budget and my points budget

Interesting point about the timing of when the SNAs are applied though. I have typically been applying them on trips booked relatively close-in, and in at least one case it seemed like other Plats were getting them cleared on the same day I got waitlisted. Would make sense if earliest request got priority.

Antonio8069

We stayed at The Palace and found it was great:
- easy access by BART to/from SFO, easy walk to China Town;
- for SPG Plat, they provide full buffet breakfast plus points amenity;
- OK gym, open 24h.
It was cheap in Feb (by SFO standards) but also available on points.

DCBob

One problem is the walls are paper thin and you can hear your next door neighbors talking. Not a good thing unless the adjacent room is vacant. And if you want modern hip decor, forget it. The rooms like like they were decorated by your great grandma.

I GREATLY prefer the W and Le Méridien. Just my peculiar taste.

jibi

I am just finishing up a 6-night trip to San Francisco for a conference. I am getting a late start on re-qualifying for PLT status, so I figured I would make this trip into a mattress run (and a great opportunity for inching toward the cycle). I stayed at the aloft, the St. Regis, the Palace, the Le Meridien, the Westin St. Francis, and the W during my trip (I will exclude the aloft, as it is what it is ... a walk down to the Hangar at the Marriott was a nice - albeit expensive - treat).

St. Regis - booked a Deluxe room, upgraded to a Grand Deluxe room
Palace - booked a Deluxe room, upgraded to a Deluxe Suite
Le Meridien - booked a Superior room, upgraded to an Business Suite
Westin St. Francis - booked a Grand Deluxe room (Tower), upgraded to an Executive Suite (Tower)
W - booked a Wonderful room, upgraded to a Fabulous room

As mentioned, I was here for a conference, so I did not really eat at the hotel restaurants or buffets since I was more likely than not to get a free meal from a vendor at a nice local restaurant (not to say the hotel restaurants weren't of the same quality, but I'm not going to turn down free). The conference was at the Mascone Center, so obviously hotels like the W, the St. Regis, and the Westin Market Street (which I did not stay at) would have scored much bigger points with me than hotels that were much further away (like the Le Meridien, which caused me about 4 blisters all on its own). I also had 1.5 days of tourism I was able to do on Saturday and Sunday (first time to SFO), so that was nice.

Best Hotel Bed: In all honesty, this is a tie for me between the Le Meridien, the St. Regis, the Westin St. Francis, and the W, and the Palace. I'm a very light and picky sleeper and it seems that the only difference between these hotels was the type of pillows they used. If it was based solely on the pillows, the Le Meridien or Palace may win in my book, but that is some major bias due to preferences.

Best Hotel Bathroom: The winner here is the St. Regis followed by a tie between the Westin St. Francis and the W. The St. Regis was the only one I felt comfortable in taking an actual bath. The shower was about twice as large as the tub and it was the only one with a separate shower and bath.

BONUS: The Le Meridien's shower featured a wraparound curtain. I'm sure this is not as unusual to some as it was to me, of course. The only problem was that I forgot about the missing third wall and reached back to catch my balance (when removing a bandage from my foot) and had one hell of a fall that ended up bruising the right side of my rib cage. The W's bathroom was the only one of the six that had an exhaust fan, which is always a plus in my book. Considering the W is known for lack of privacy in their bathrooms, this was a nice feature, especially if there is more than one person staying in the room (my wife stayed at home for this trip).

Best View: This has to go to the Westin St. Francis, but this is also based on my various room placements... obviously this would likely differ if I had a Bay view at the W, a smaller room with less of a view, etc. My suite at the Westin was a corner room with three half-hexagon window configurations - one overlooking Union Square and the other two with a South view, such as Sutro Tower).



Best Overall Room: All things considered, I would book again at the Westin St. Francis, the St. Regis, and the W. If the Le Meridien was not so damn far away from everything I was doing, that would also be an option.

BONUS: This is not to say that the Palace was not a nice hotel, but there were two things that really annoyed me about the hotel: 1) the number of visible power outlets and 2) the bath tub. The power outlets are installed on the floor (as opposed to on the wall), so it can be rather difficult to move antique furniture to expose an outlet near the bed. As for the tub/shower, umm... there's really no excuse for what they put in there, but they could have dressed it up a bit.

Best Bathroom Amenities: The W obviously has everyone beat in terms of their product (at least in my opinion). I found it interesting that the aloft actually included a hand loofah that was twice as large as the one at the St. Regis (and no one else provided a loofah or a "shower poof," which my local Sheraton at ATL now provides).

Most Welcoming Staff (to a person not in a suit): The front desk and bell hops at the Palace and St. Regis were hands down my favorite. The St. Regis actually let me check in at 6am, which was incredible (I had to be at an early tour departure on Union Square, so I was just going to check my bags). The front desk at the Westin St. Francis was great, but the bell hops actually had an attitude about checking my bags (one guy scanned me up and down with his eyes then literally put his nose up).

Best Location: As mentioned before, it really depends on what you want to do. If you want to catch a game at AT&T Park or you are at a conference at the Mascone Center, the W is the best location (although the St. Regis and the Westin Market Street are pretty close as well). If you want to visit Alcatraz or Fisherman's Wharf, see some famous places like Russian Hill/Lombard Street, etc., then the Sheraton Fisherman's Wharf may be a better option than most of the other hotels. I spent a lot of my time walking on Saturday and Sunday (I believe I'm up to about 28 miles on the week) and I will say that there's a lot of deceiving distance between a LOT of the major tourist sights in the city. For example, walking to Alamo Square from the Palace was not necessarily a good idea ... continuing on to Haight-Ashbury was even dumber. For one, Google Maps does not really tell you to steer clear of certain neighborhoods. For two, Google Maps does not tell you that there will be a really big ... hill for you to climb (and it never fails that the return trip will not take you back down that hill but rather up another).

Worst Internet: In a review of bests, I must point out two hotels and internet issues. The Le Meridien's internet service was downright dreadful. Considering it is in the financial district and a lot of business types would be expected to frequent the upscale business hotel, it would make sense that the internet service should be one of the best in the city. That is so far from the truth. The W's hotel service was up then down (rinse and repeat) for me. Fortunately, I am savvy enough with technology that I realized it was an issue with their internal DNS server rather than the connection itself. I switched my DNS server to Google's public DNS server (8.8.8.8) and I have not had an issue since. This may be more reflective of tonight's experience rather than a persistent issue with the W's internet service, but it had to be mentioned (as it is completely avoidable).

EDIT: It appears that the W's internet service just sucks rather than it's DNS service. It delivers a full 2Mbps experience when it is online. However, I've had a running ping for a few hours and have received a 9% packet loss (usually in long doses). I simply have to disconnect from Wi-Fi then reconnect to get back online. This is kind of ridiculous.

I can provide more information about these locations, if anyone wants to know anything. Overall I had a lot of fun seeing all of these hotels. However, I doubt I will do it again if I come back next year for the same conference.

MarkedMan

Thanks for the condensed comparison of hotels, useful for a local who never stays in these places but is asked about them from time to time. I'm disappointed you couldn't compare the Westin MS

There's a well known cyclist map that lays out the least steep routes to get from A to B in the city. Even more useful for walkers I guess. I've done the walk from the center out here a few times, like when there's a world series parade and getting Muni isn't really an option, but it's not one you would want to do after you've walked 20 miles in a week already, or on the wrong street for sure. It can be quite punitive.

jibi

I'm usually quite prepared for trips, but I approached this one quite casually (to the point where I had to get my Alcatraz tickets through a city tour service, which wasn't really that bad of an option for someone that had never been to San Francisco and had a new camera). I wish I would have known about the hills and the cyclist map, though... that would have been golden information! Of course, the killer hill was the one up Lombard Street ... the first hill was bad, but the second one just about killed me. I actually saw someone running up it, which I found to be quite incredible!

I wish I could have gotten to the WMS, as well... but with the conference in town, they only had two-night minimums for most of the week (with my corporate rate, that is) and that didn't work for my mattress hopping

azeckel

My personal preference in the city is the Palace, though I've never stayed at the St. Regis or W.

What would your preference be between the Westin St. Francis and the W? The Palace is sadly not available. We are on vacation and haven't really mapped out our plan, so either location is fine.

TRAVELSIG

W: It is actually quite consistent.

bgriff

If you like Ws, with all the pros and cons they typically entail, then stay there. I would say the W SF is broadly typical of the brand, except perhaps that suite upgrades are unusually uncommon. The Westin is tourist central, both inside and outside the hotel, but if you don't like Ws then the Westin is an okay choice.

rooivalk

Hi,

Which property would be best for a first-time tourist to San Francisco? We are a couple and I plan on using points for a 5 night stay. We are looking to go early October.

My options now are:

Westin St. Francis - 48k points
Westin Market Street - 52k points
Palace - 52k points
W - 64k points

The St Regis at 100k points seems too much to pay for (I can afford it but I don't think it's worth the extra) unless someone can justify otherwise..

Currently leaning towards the Palace as they have the biggest standard rooms (I am Plat Ambassador but that doesn't guarantee an upgrade) but the W seems to have good reviews as well. Are they worth the extra 12k points?

ezron

As tourists(and Plat) we just did the Westin St Francis .....

and LOVED the location and the Hotel

---just my 2 cents

MarkedMan

There is something to be said for the Union Square location, for sure. IMO you have better bars walking distance from the St Francis, better restaurants if walking from the W or the Palace, but in this place it's hard to not find good joints from either locations.

The St Regis is a cut above, but if you're going to be out and about doing stuff probably not worth the double points. You can still dine at its excellent restaurant and collect SPG points in the process

The W is worth it if you dislike previous-turn-of-the-century look and feel; that's what St Francis and the Palace will deliver. W is a W.

ezron

more on the St Francis....we were given a very spacious Tower Room

(newer section) on a high floor with a great view of Union Sq .....and my wife

LOVED the glass elevator ride.