Galway hotel rooms are the dearest in Europe - survey

It is now more expensive to stay a night in Galway than anywhere else in Ireland or in top European city destinations such as Barcelona, Amsterdam, Rome, Madrid and even London. For the third time in a row, Galway hotel prices are the highest in Ireland at an average of €110 per room, per night despite a 26% fall in the first six months of 2009 compared to the same period in 2008, according to the latest figures released in the Hotels.com Hotel Price Index (HPI). Galway was 39% more expensive than Cork, where the average room cost €79, and 45% dearer than Dublin, where the average room on the website fetched €76. The capital of the west was also a whopping 70% above Limerick, which had the cheapest city hotel rooms in the country. Cork experienced the biggest drop in prices with tariffs 33% lower than the same period the year before, followed by Galway (26%), Dublin (27%) and Limerick (17%).In fact Dublin experienced the steepest price fall of any of the major European cities, along with Barcelona where hotel prices slumped by 27% and room rates averaged at €76 per night, compared to €105 the year previous.Galway was at the top of the price list for city hotels for the last three years in a row.As a nation, Ireland experienced the largest drop in hotel prices of the major European countries (down 26% on the same period last year), ahead of Norway and Austria which experienced a hotel price drop of 24% and 23% respectively.The average price of €80 paid for a hotel room in Ireland in the first six months of 2009, compared to €108 paid for the same period in 2008, also made Ireland the least expensive Western European nation, following the three Eastern European nations of Poland, Hungary and Czech Republic where the lowest hotel rooms prices were recorded in the Eurozone. The survey tracks the real prices paid per hotel room rather than advertised rates. It is based on the money handed over by customers on booking over the website for 78,000 hotels across 13,000 locations around the world. David Roche, president of Hotels.com said with airline prices falling at similar rates to hotels, there has never been a better time for travellers to pack their bags and head off.