Secret travel tip to see a photo of that cheap room you're booking online

The so-called "opaque" booking sites are some of the best deals in travel. The cheapest hotel rates on sites such as Priceline and Hotwire come with strings attached: You don't know which property you're paying to book, you just know you're getting the lowest price. The price is right, but there's a strong risk of getting stuck with a dud hotel.

But I've discovered that one of the opaque bookings sites, LastMinuteTravel.com, has a secret loophole that will show you a photo of that dirt-cheap no-name hotel. If you know the trick, you won't be booking blindly any more.

The secret lies in calling up the aerial photograph of the neighborhood on the locator map that comes up with every blind hotel result.