If you only have short notice, don’t call the hotel. They have what they call a rack rate and it’s usually the most expensive way to book a room, it will be full rate, with no perks. The first place that you should try is a website calledlate rooms .
This website has excellent room rates, sometimes with meals included at very reasonable prices. You can start checking the site long in advance of your stay to monitor the prices which tend to fall and rise.
The next place is simply go to Google and type ‘Hotels and the City you want’. Some of the good sites include HotelPronto, which can undercut a lot of the room rates and will often try to get a meal included. This type of website is worth looking around for to check the deals, I once got a room for two nights with dinner and breakfast for less than the hotel were advertising the room for.