Milner Hotel Boston

Just back from Moscow via Boston on Lufthansa, connecting to Boston on Vermont Transit Lines. Very interesting trip --if you're going to Russia take lots of money. Much more about Moscow coming soon, but first I wanted to mention the Milner Hotel, where I stayed in downtown Boston the night of September 5. The location of this hotel is great, just two or three blocks from the T, which offers good connections to the airport and all over Boston. The fare to get to the airport is only $2, but I actually rode for free thanks to a very helpful employee who passed me through without charging (thanks whoever you are) when he saw me struggling with luggage. People in Boston were very nice, I found on my short visit. The Milner is also very close to the Boston Common and a great bookstore on Newbury Street, and to a branch of the very pleasant restaurant Legal Seafoods, where I enjoyed a tasty dinner of clam chowder, a crab cake and a beer.

The Milner Hotel is old but clean and not bad if you really, really need to save money. Never have I seen a smaller hotel room--I"ve seen many larger closets. It had just a single bed, not even a door on the bathroom (would have taken too much room out of what must have originally been a closet or perhaps at best a servant's room. ) The air conditioner helped to drown out the traffic noise. Continental breakfast was Ok, served in another quite compact room on the ground floor. With tax the bill for one night came to $149 --not cheap for a closet, but I guess lower than the other nearby hotels where you might get an actual room (no guarantees --just a guess.)

Hotel prices are rising very fast everywhere, it seems. That's why it's more important than ever to be armed with advance knowledge of what you are likely to encounter, the kind of knowledge I and others are trying to provide on keeping travel costs down.