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Escape Route: Hotels With Secret Entrances and Exits

If you've got the means and the desire, you can find several hotels around the country that offer stealth access for VIPs. Here are five of the coolest.
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Conde Nast Traveler

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Ok, I know what you're thinking. But actually, there are plenty of reasons someone could need a hotel with a secret entrance or exit. Off the top of my head: you're a celebrity, royal, or political figure; you sometimes go by the alias 007; your ride is the Batmobile. See? Totally reasonable.

Either way, if you've got the means and the desire, you can find several hotels around the country that offer stealth access for VIPs. Here are five of the coolest:

By Maddie Donnelly, Condé Nast Traveler

Secret Entrance Hotels
(01 of05)
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THE WALDORF-ASTORIA, NYCEver heard of Track 61? Probably not. It’s the secret extension of the New York City subway system that ran directly underneath the Waldorf. No longer in operation, it used to escort the likes of Andy Warhol and FDR under the city to the hotel. Once it arrived, a separate car detached and fit into an elevator that carried the precious cargo directly into the Waldorf. Dan Brucker, a spokesperson for Metro-North Railroad and a wealth of knowledge about Grand Central (Metro-North's terminal), explains this photo of FDR with General Douglas MacArthur and Adlai Stevenson: "There is a train car in the background, but it's not FDR's," he says. "You will also notice that on the far right of the photo is a man with a dark jacket and light-colored pants with a dark stripe—a bell boy from the Waldorf-Astoria that will escort them up and into the Grand Ballroom via the elevator."
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THE FAIRMONT PENTHOUSE SUITE, SAN FRANCISCOThe world-famous Penthouse Suite on the Fairmont’s eighth floor has hosted every president since its 1926 inception. So it’s no surprise that the suite has not one but two secret passageways within. The first, hidden in the second-floor library, leads elsewhere within the suite (yes, it’s that big). The second is a hidden entranceway to the suite from the seventh floor, frequently used by secret service to monitor security.
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THE PENINSULA, BEVERLY HILLSAlthough this kind of goes against everything you’d think the typical Beverly Hills bigwig might want—that is, to be noticed and/or have a photo snapped by a creep hiding in a bush—the $3,500-per-night villas at the Peninsula offer guests their own “discreet” entrances through which they can enter and exit the hotel property.
(04 of05)
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THE GANSEVOORT, MIAMIIf you’re on vacation in South Beach, chances are you’re not there to sit on the beach and read the new Steve Jobs bio. Which is why the Gansevoort built in a secret entrance to its super exclusive nightclub, LOUIS, just for hotel guests. It bypasses the club’s main reception area and guarantees admission.
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THE GREENBRIER, WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, WVThis one is more Washington’s escape plan than a secret entrance; still, the bunker at the Greenbrier is easily the most elaborate hidden chamber known to exist within any hotel in the U.S. Built at the height of the Cold War, the 53-room compound can be accessed via four secret entrances spread throughout the hotel’s West Virginia Wing, and was designed to house the entire United States Congress in the case of a nuclear disaster. It existence was revealed in a 1992 Washington Post exposé.

More from Condé Nast Traveler:

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