A few more thoughts
 

I wholely concur with my Big Bruddar PremEx's review and just want to add a few thoughts.

I went to the Bar Marie Antoniette which is right off Les Trois Marches. It's a homey place with a roaring fireplace, leather chairs and sofas and a very attentive and friendly staff (even if your French like mine is abismal.) The clientle is a nice mix of locals coming for esquisite deserts like eclairs and chocolate cake and the tourists. I met with two gentlemen from Atlanta and a former Brooklynite who came to France two years ago, set up an Internet cafe and fell in love with a local (they married on Christmas Day last year!)

A nice variety of drinks, although I almost gagged at the 14 Euros for a Coca Cola (could not pay that, even if it was PEPSI on the menu.) They also have a very impressive cigar selection in a well maintained humidor. I told the server I just died and went to heaven upon seeing Romeo and Julieta Delux Sedras #3 as one offering. It made for two very nice smokes, accompanied with a fine Black Russian.

The cigar was 13 euros each. It's sad a Cuban cigar costs less than a COKE!

If you get one of the suites that we got you can look out at night and see Daisy and her sheep friends sitting in the grass near the hotel. In the middle of the night I heard cows mooing. Sure enough... cows right outside my window!

The little town has a nice variety of restaurants and, as PremEx said, the open market is fabulous. One restaurant PremEx and Holly found that was FOUR PAWS up in my book was Les Beofe a La Mode which for 26 Euros you get great serve and three fine courses including excellent steak and home made frites. For steak lovers you can have a great taste of the finest in cow (probably bought earlier in the day from the open air market.)

Ditto. A great hotel and nice little town.

Westin Trianon Palace..Getting a little worried!
 

Have an upcoming stay this weekend @ Westin Trianon Palace, Versailles, Paris. Reading some of the reviews from TripAdvisor, they seem to be a few negative comments on the hotel. I'm PLAT paying Cash+SP and wanted to know if anyone else here has stayed at this location?

Many thanks.

Stayed here in Dec of '03 on an award. I had a great experience. They upgraded me to a large room at the main hotel building (I guess you'd call it the "palace") with a separate office. When I came back the first evening (I checked in in the morning) there was a bottle of wine in the office -- I suppose that was my Plat amenity.

The shower was tiny and left a little bit something to be desired, the high speed internet connectivity was ridiculously overpriced and so was the buffet breakfast. However, the breakfast was very tasty. :)

It's a great location for exploring Versailles, though. Not so good for exploring Paris.

We stayed on free awards just last month and got the full Platinum treatment, including a great Suite upgrade. No complaints from this Platinum.

I started a thread with a full review last month, but using the crummy google search, I couldn't find it. Perhaps a Moderator who has real Search capabilities can find it?

In the meantime, here are the photos of our February 2005 Suite there:

http://members.aol.com/premexfiles/westCDG107_109.jpg

Looks like the place has not changed.... Great pics !

Re worries : please make sure that your booking is in the Palace building, and not in the Pavillion building (complaints generally relate to this particular building).

Here are some recent FT reports (the first one is PremEx's). It's been a couple of years since I've been there, but I had a very enjoyable stay. I wouldn't worry.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showt...Trianon+Palace

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showt...Trianon+Palace

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showt...Trianon+Palace

Great property
Last stay was 2 years ago, no suite then but got a very large room with a beautiful bathroom. Yes make sure you get a room in the main building. Location is right near the Chateau, actually they have a gate probably 50ft from the property. Very quiet. Spa is fantastic.

It is a 45min ride on the RER to downtown Paris but with a Paris visite card it is quite cheap to commute. I am going there this weekend and will stay at the Prince de Galles but would return anytime to the Trianon.

Even Pavilion Was Great
 

Got excellent service at Pavillion. Was only Gold so upgraded to nice room in the Pavillion section. You will like your stay.

Does this hotel charge for parking?

not that I recall
 

I was there about two years ago with a rental car--I don't remember being charged for parking.

I'm just completing a 1-night stay here on points. Disappointed after reading these posts of wonderful stays. Got a standard room on the SPG floor which is O.K. but falling into disrepair. Bathroom is nice and large though with the heavenly shower plus an additional nozzle.

No Platinum amenity and when I asked was told it isn't offered on stays with points. Staying 110-125 paid nights per year at SPG properties, I know this isn't true.

It is good they don't consider this a Level 5 property because had I spent more than 10000 points I would be quite unhappy.

Someone posted it's a 20 minute walk to the train station and some else posted it's 800 yards away. So what's the real deal?

Actually, they are both right, as there are two train stations. If you are coming from Paris , you probably will be taking the RER Line 'C' (at least, we did). The Trianon Palace is right at the entrance to Versailles. I have pasted a quote from something I found on the Web, and agree with the 10 minute walking time:
"Versailles is about 20km south-west of Paris. You can travel there easily using public transport:
- From central Paris take RER Line C (a suburban train) to Versailles-Rive Gauche (the last stop for trains called VICK). Note that you cannot use a metro ticket. Some of the stations from which you can start are Gare d'Austerlitz, St Michel-Notre Dame, Musee d'Orsay, Invalides, Pont de l'Alma or Champ de Mars-Tour Eiffel. The journey lasts about 40 minutes (trains leave approximately every 20 or 30 minutes). It is a 10 minute walk from the station to the palace (cross the road after leaving the train station, turn right, then take the next road on the left - Rue de Paris: you will see the palace gates in front of you). Ticket offices at some RER stations sell a return train ticket together with a "one-day pass" entrance ticket for the palace which will save you time queuing at Versailles.
- Alternatively, you can reach the palace by taking an SNCF service (a mainline train) from Gare Montparnasse to Versailles-Chantiers, or from Gare Saint-Lazare to Versailles-Rive Droite. These destination stations are both in Versailles, but are a bit further from the palace."

Westin Trianon Palace Versailles promo rates from 155 euro--very limited dates
 

With our "Autumn Internet Special", stay in style and still have money left for sight-seeing, shopping, pampering and dining. Besides its breathtaking beauty, the Trianon Palace & Spa has a wealth of activities to offer!

Limited Time Offer from EUR 155*

Including Buffet Breakfast
Rate is based on double occupancy in a Pavilion standard room
Valid for stays between October 21st and 23rd 2005, October 28th and November 6th 2005 and November 10th and 13th 2005.
Offer subject to availability. Reservation must be booked online. Fully prepaid. Non-refundable and non-changeable.

The special rate plan code is STARG5 (sorry, I don't know how to post the link that directly goes to this reservation page).

*I checked the rates for a test date, and it comes out to 155 euro for the room and not per person, inclusive of tax. This is about 40 eur cheaper than the other more widely available winter rate they currently have.

I just stayed at the hotel, and it is lovely. Definitely the place to stay at if you are visiting Versailles (especially if you are going with people who need afternoon breaks from sightseeing). The hotel is showing some signs of age, and the bathrooms aren't the most luxurious (though one of our rooms did have a spa shower, with 6 horizontal jets--though the shower itself was a rather tiny pre-fab plastic unit!) but it is still cool to stay in a "palace" type room when visiting the big palace! The included buffet breakfast is very good--not worth the 27 euro they charge, but I would say we got ~$15-20 value out of it.

Also, note that this offer is only for the pavilion rooms. We stayed in the palace section, and I would recommend using the 1000 spg points to upgrade.

Thanks for the heads up. This sounds like a good offer.


No petit dejeuner is worth the price that luxury hotels charge in Paris. €27 is expensive. But it gets worse:

http://eng.plaza-athenee-paris.com/p...ejeuner-us.htm

What do you think Carrie Bradshaw had for breakfast? ;)