Crowne Plaza Denver lowest published rate was $199 per night for a Standard Room Wednesday, Feb 20. The lowest rate found on Kayak.com for a Standard Room was $107.65 at getaroom.com. Rates on both sites were refundable rates with getaroom.com allowing cancellation until Monday, 10pm 2/18 with no charge and IHG site allowing cancellation to Tuesday, 6pm 2/19 with no penalty.

I booked the $199 room on the IHG site and immediately filed a Best Price Guarantee claim with InterContinental Hotels Group on Saturday, February 16. Within 12 hours my claim was approved and I was notified the room night at Crowne Plaza Denver would be free. Read More…

• Grand Hyatt Denver with a suite upgrade.
• Fairfield Inn Cherry Creek with a Look No Further 25% discount rate.
• Crowne Plaza Denver with a Best Price Guarantee free night.

After basking in the 80 degree sun of Monterey Bay with sea otters and sea lions on Friday, Feb 15, I had my hands freezing on the chilled steering wheel of a Toyota Corolla driving out of DIA, Denver International Airport 48 hours later on Sunday night. Despite the one-day hot spell in Monterey, the temperature this winter has been abnormally chilly in central coast California with overnight lows frequently in the 30s since December. I packed the right clothes for a high plains drifter spending time in cold weather Denver.

Southwest Airlines out of San Jose got us to Denver on time and we were on I-70 heading to the Grand Hyatt Downtown Denver before midnight. One interesting observation is the rental car rate offered at the time I booked my Southwest Airlines ticket was $90 from Payless for four days and that rate was comparable to the best rate I eventually found from FOX car rental at DIA.

Grand Hyatt Denver was part of my four night Denver hotel plan since the AAA rate was $89 last Sunday night for a downtown Denver hotel. Rates went over $200 per night for Monday and the hotel was sold out for Tuesday during the weekdays when a banking conference was in town. I had a Diamond member suite upgrade to burn before expiration at the end of February. Read More…