I recently planned a long weekend in London. I was on a pretty tight budget, so I was on the lookout for some cheap accommodation. I started off looking bed and breakfast - some of this is pretty cheap, but it's often miles away from the centre of the city. Next were the small private hotels. These start at around £45 a night for a double room, though not all of them look too nice. I was booking at fairly short notice, and was found that all the nicer places were booked up, and those that weren't gave a good clue why when my enquires received a distinctly frosty reception. I've stayed in Travel Lodge kind of places a few times, but it's only in the last few years that these staples of the motorway service station have made their way into the capital. Checking the Forte website (double rooms from around £40 was the claim) en enquiry showed that a room in central London would cost over £80 - far too much when we'd been trying to budget for a maximum of £50 a night. Searching around though, I found the website for Travel Inn. They have several hotels in central London, and all rooms are £62.95 for the night. This was stretching our budget a long way, but it seemed like the only decent place we had a chance of getting booked into. Our first choice of hotel (at County Hall) was fully booked - we were after all trying to book only a week before arrival, but a call to the Euston Travel Inn had a room booked in no time.

Arriving into London at St Pancras station, the Euston Travel in is superbly located - barely a five minute walk from the station, and it would be equally handy for Kings Cross and Euston. We arrived early, but they let us check in and pay, and leave our bags until our room was ready. We stopped for a drink in the very pleasant and reasonably priced bar before heading out for the afternoon. Tottenham Court Road is only a fairly short walk away, so with a shopping trip planned for the afternoon, we didn't even need to both
er travelling by tube. Visiting the British Museum on way back, we found that this attraction was also within easy walking distance of the hotel. Checking in, we found the room to be fairly spacious with a comfortable double bed. We'd chosen a smoking room, and there were plenty of ash trays. There was of course the usual tea and coffee making facilities (though two teabags seemed a bit tight). The hotel has en-suite facilities in every room (which was nice, as having our own shower was in doubt after looking at so many small cheap hotels) and they were truly superb. A really deep bath that filled in seconds, plenty of hot water, and a powerful shower that was virtually worth this price of the room in itself.

Access to the room is via a key card, which can also be used to get into the hotel itself if you arrive back late at night, which is reassuring. On leaving the hotel, we were allowed to leave our bags (which are tagged for identification, and locked in a secure room) so that we could pick them up on our way past the hotel to the station that night.

The hotel is ideally located, reasonably priced and comfortable. The only thing I can think to say against it, is that it's shame breakfast wasn't included in the price. Highly recommended though.