moondog

I would just go with the westin chaoyang in this case because the area is lively, and it's pretty easy to head north from there the next day. Alternatively, the great Wall Sheraton is pretty much across the street and much cheaper.

You could stay downtown, but there isn't much to see or do there at night, and it is at least 30 minutes further from mutianyu during the morning rush.

FlightNurse

we stayed at the Renaissance Wangfujing we could see the Forbidden City from our room, but still was a 15 minute car ride. You might want to think of doing a tour, that is what we did for the two nights we stayed in PEK. Here is URL of the company we used Beijing Tour: Beijing Tours, Beijing China Tours - Tour-Beijing.Com I highly recommend them. When do you plan on going?

PrivatePilot

Thanks. Plan on going early Jan. Looking at the Renn as well but not sure if they have airport pick up.

moondog

They do, and I've used it for clients a few times, but taxis are honestly pretty easy to get at PEK.

FlightNurse

Do they speak English? I used our hotel car service, the driver spoke English and explained a lot about people drive in PEK it was a nice education time on the hour and half it took us to get to the airport and back.

moondog

I certainly wouldn't bank on it. There are much better jobs available for people who are fluent in English.

FlightNurse

This was the reason why we took the Hotel transportation much easier to communicate then having to point.

Muerz

moondog

When you have a chance, I suggest you create a list of current properties with redemption rates (you will get a big group hug, if you pull this off!), and then we can opine on location v price.

Muerz

Beijing Area hotels by redemption category

Category 2 - 12'500 points per night

• Four Points by Sheraton Langfang
• Four Points by Sheraton Beijing Haidian
• Aloft Beijing Haidian
• Courtyard Beijing Northeast
• Sheraton Langfang Chaobai River

Category 3 - 17'500 points per night

• Beijing Marriott Changping
• Beijing Marriott Northeast
• Renaissance Beijing Capital
• Renaissance Beijing Wangfujing
• JW Marriott Beijing
• JW Marriott Beijing Central

Category 4 - 25'000 points per night

• Sheraton Grand Beijing Dongcheng
• Westin Beijing Chaoyang
• Westin Beijing Financial Street
• W Beijing Chang'an

Category 5 - 35'000 points per night

• Ritz Carlton Beijing
• Ritz Carlton Beijing Financial Street
• St. Regis Beijing

No category yet or point redemption not possible

• Bulgari Beijing
• Sheraton Beijing Lize
• Sheraton Beijing Huairou
• Imperial Mansion Marriott Executive Apartments
• Sandalwood Marriott Executive Apartments

Compared to Shanghai, this list of properties is rather manageable...

moondog

Many thanks for providing the current redemption list! I would add it to the Wikipost myself because the information is extremely useful, but I'm not certain about Wikipost standards in this forum.

Following are my thoughts:
1. Location trumps hotel quality, free breakfasts, concierge competency, etc (e.g. even if the Langfeng Sheraton was the nicest hotel in the world, I couldn't possibly endorse it)

2. Middle of the city options command a premium in terms of both cash and points
a. for first time visitors who only have 2-3 days in Beijing, paying up makes sense
b. but, for people with 4-5 days (like yourself), staying in Chaoyang is generally a better choice

3. The Courtyard NE is a hands down winner in category 2, but the Haidian properties are both okay IFF you want to focus your Beijing visit on Haidian, Summer Palace, Changping

4. As for category 3
a. in spite of 1, I simply love the Marriott NE; the location is slightly worse than the Courtyard NE, but the hard product is supreme
b. JW Central and Ren Wangfujing are both good values for those who have limited time (refer to 2a)
c. The Changping property must be special since it's in cat 3, but staying up there pretty much limits you to hot springs, and nature related excursions
d. I like the Capital Ren for personal reasons (e.g. if you happen to have friends in Shuangjing, it's a great choice)

5. None of the cat 4/5 properties justify a premium v cat 2 properties
a. Financial Street is not cool
b. the cat 5 RC is almost identical to the cat 3 JW in the same building
c. I do like the St Regis and Westin Chaoyang, but neither are appreciably better than the cat 3 options

6. If you really want to stay in the center of the city when the weather is nice, check out the Emperor Hotel
a. two prominent FT people invited me to visit them for happy hour
b. climbing up 5 flights of stairs pissed me off until I actually got to experience the rooftop; honestly stunning views of the Forbidden City, CBD, and even points north

Muerz

Jiatong

Oh, some of the BJ Marriotts category's go up on March 5th, (ie JW ) And some of the BJ & SH Hyatt's go down in mid March.

SkiAdcock

BTW - MAR has some new Beijing full-service properties opening soon, but the info is so limited/non-existent (other than literally the hotel name) that even I haven't started Master Threads on them yet. What boggles my mind is some of these properties have Feb March openings & yet there's nothing re: them on the website.

Cheers.

Muerz