Need advice on Booking a hotel in Fort Laiderdale

Looking for good advice on booking a hotel room in Fort Lauderdale for Saturday night, March 18, 2016.

I book a Holland American Cruise departs on Sunday, March 19,2016, and want to arrive in Fort Lauderdale one day ahead; and therefore need to stay in Fort Lauderdale for one night.

I researched hotels.com, experia.ca and few other sources. I finally booked Ramada For Lauderdale Oakland Park on line because it provides shuttles to/from Air port and Cruise port. It advertised for 183.00CAD for that day. However, it charge tax and fee of 71.05CAD. With a coupon of 10% discount, the final total ends up to 236.13CAD.

Why does it charge so much tax and fee?

Any one can provide suggestion for a reasonable priced place to stay for one night, March 18,2016?

Lago Mar !!

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Tripadvisors.com. Look for Fort Lauderdale HOSTELS if by yourself.Resort taxes always high.

March is the height of the high season in Fort Lauderdale.

ALL hotels in Ft. Laud and Miami are EXPENSIVE! Any time of year....$300 per night is considered "cheap". Gotta roll with the flow!

You are cutting it fine getting any hotel at all, booking this late.

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ALL hotels in Ft. Laud and Miami are EXPENSIVE! Any time of year....$300 per night is considered "cheap". Gotta roll with the flow!

Really,cb? We just returned from Ft. Lauderdale and stayed in a very nice hotel (Cambria Suites) for a little over $200 and there are plenty of hotels in the Miami/Ft. L. area for cheaper than that. Maybe not your big name brands, but very clean, comfortable hotels. I speak from personal experience....do you?

Really,cb? We just returned from Ft. Lauderdale and stayed in a very nice hotel (Cambria Suites) for a little over $200 and there are plenty of hotels in the Miami/Ft. L. area for cheaper than that. Maybe not your big name brands, but very clean, comfortable hotels. I speak from personal experience....do you?

Actually the OP is in the same price range as your stay. CA$236 exchanges to roughly US$180 at this writing. Which is eminently fair for the property in question. And while a bit brusquely put, the previous posts stating that it is extremely unlikely to find something less expensive yet reasonably convenient to the airport and port--given that it is less than a month out and during the peak of the peak--are on point. Unfortunately the exchange rate is what it is.

And yes it is very common for travel reseller sites to back out all sorts of taxes and fees to be able to post lowball prices then add the fees back on the payment screen, whereas the hotel chains' proprietary sites quote grand totals from the beginning. Online cruise TAs do the exact same thing.

We have stayed many times at the Embassy Suites on 17th Street both pre and post cruise.

They have free full breakfast and a managers cocktail time in the evening with munchies.

Taxis are not that expensive -- we use them to get back and forth from the airport and ship. All close to each other. And there is the Harbor Shops behind the Embassy where you can pick up anything you may have forgotten.

As you are on a HAL ship, each adult over the age of 21 can bring onto the ship a 750 ml bottle of wine for cabin consumption without paying a corkage fee. And you can by your wine at Total Wine in the Harbor Shops.

There are lots of restaurants in the 17th Street area and Harbor Shops.

If the prices of hotels are out of budget, you should try AirBnb.

Most of the time, I stay in hotels as well, but during my last cruise in Jan, I waited too long to book a hotel as well. Prices were through the roof.

I found an AirBnb for $100 per night. It was a complete bungalow, with all the comfort you need.

Don't limit yourself to hotels when it comes down to sleeping accommodation.

Hotels in Fort Lauderdale are pricey, and being a fellow Canadian I feel your pain on the exchange rate. I usually book any hotel upto a year in advance on booking.com and check the prices every week or so, if the price goes down I cancel and rebook. Just watch some hotels do charge a prepayment, others pay when you arrive, and some have no cancellation, read the fine print. There are deals to be had though. Last year I was able to book the Hilton Fort Lauderdale Beach Resort king size suite with kitchen and ocean view balcony for $688us for a week! Right now it is listed as $412cdn a night!!!:eek:

For a 3 star or better, you are around the $230cdn mark a night all in. It is what it is, just consider it part of your vacation and enjoy yourself :)

You will also find everything in Fort Lauderdale is priced the same or higher as if you were in Canada, but add in the exchange rate and things can get pricey. I suggest you check Groupon for restaurant deals, we did and were able to save quite a bit of money. I added the app to my phone and would buy groupons on the fly to redeem for food, entertainment etc..