Best value for a rewards booking?
 

Which Carlson hotels, in your opinion, offer the best value when paying with points?

What region of the world are you considering? You will find recent discussion about Europe here:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/carls...cc-points.html

First, you might want to look on 9k hotels before devaluation. My favorites are en-route to Europe Park Inn Kaunas or Vilnius depending on route. Kaunas hotel is actually very nice for Park Inn. Radisson Blu Daugava is only 15000 for a fabulous hotel near the river overlooking old city.

Point rates will change June 1, 2015.

Second approach is to hit over-hyped destinations in peak times. New York is good example if there's availability. I recently booked Salzburg, Austria for 44000 points a night. Advance purchase rate is EUR 356 whilst standard flexible room goes for almost EUR 400.

OT: make sure to mention your status during check-in. The Salzburg Hotel has just a franchise agreement and is not a Radisson Blu. They have a different booking system and won't know about your status... Btw a highly overrated hotel in my opinion but the location is great for Salzburg.

Which Carlson hotels, in your opinion, offer the best value when paying with points?

For me, any hotel that you can get during extreme demand, for example CI&S Louisville during Kentucky Derby -$600 night, during sporting events, etc. I like sporting events and can get $300 per night value.

I booked for ci&s for mardi gras.

Thanks for the suggestions ... do you know why the Daugava is priced so much lower (both in points as well as €) than all the other Radisson hotels in Ryga?

Also, in Vilnius, is the Royal Astorija that much better than the Park Inn to be worth an additional 29,000 points per night?

Also, how do you travel from Riga to 'Europe' via Kaunas / Vilnius, other than flying? Do you take the ferry from Kaunas to Germany or some other way?

Daugava has excellent views over the old city but it is not located in or nearby the old city itself. It is cumbersome to walk for 10-15 minutes across the bridge in bad weather. Also surroundings of the hotel to other side are not very nice. Economy rooms are terrible. Standard room with Gold status should get you either no view Business class or Daugava view regular room. Concierge booking standard room, including 2for1 or points+cash usually brings everything - business room with all movies free, city view, breakfast. Extreme demand dates might be not as good, for example November 18, Independence of Latvia with fireworks very close to the hotel.

Astorija in Vilnius is a solid hotel and historic building in the city center. No status guests in regular rooms have to pay for using fitness/pool facilities.

Park Inn Vilnius is very basic. It is far away from the city center. It feels more like a motel. Advantages of the hotel are price, location not to hit city traffic jam while driving and proximity to Vichy aqua park or nearby shopping center with some decent dining options. I've sometimes stayed there before/after flight out of VNO.

I drive to Europe on leisure trips. My first stop after work is Park Inn Kaunas. This is a decent 3* hotel. No motel feeling at all. After Kaunas I drive to Warsaw. Roads in Poland are rapidly developing, more and more German style motorways. Some of them are toll roads which is fine be me. After Warsaw it is either to Berlin, Germany or down to Czech Republic. I am not fan of ferries. They are expensive, slow and noisy from Latvia/Lithuania to Germany.

Best Club Carlson redemption values
 

For me, the better hotels in London offer good value. I like to stay near the center of the city (Mayfair/Green Park or Radisson Blu Leicester Square). Any decent hotel will usually cost $350-$400 night or more if paying with cash (except lower prices are often available on Sundays), so even the post-devaluation price of 70,000 points/night is a reasonable value. (Pre-deval, I felt CC points were worth 0.5 cents each. Post-deval, 0.3 cents each seems about right.)