I will never, ever stay here again, at least until there is a change in management. More's the pity, as I have stayed here many times before and always liked the place. But that was under old management.
Good stuff first: superb location, effortless and friendly check-in, very nice rooms with great bathrooms!
Then the fun started. I'm an amputee, so asked at check-in for a shower stool/bench ($40 and up at Amazon). No problem, it will be sent up at once. I went out to dinner - when I came back, no stool. In the morning I asked the concierge for a shower stool. No problem. After going out to lunch and a museum, on return - no stool. In the evening I called the front desk; after putting me on hold - "We don't have any in the hotel." Let me point out that tubs are lethal to climb up out of with one leg; sitting on the floor in the shower is miserable.
So then I decided I couldn't live with myself without a shower. But no: the hot/cold water system provided icy cold, scalding hot, or with the knob in the middle, pulsing from scalding to cool, with the former dominant. So despite dangers, I tried the tub, thinking the pulsing might even out. Sorta. But rinsing off with the hand-held sprayer had to be done in the short intervals between scalding and barely warm.
On the first morning, the coffee machine didn't work. The handset for the phone didn't work.
Laundry: expensive, but I needed two clean shirts. Drop them off by 8:30, or call housekeeping for collection. Called housekeeping - who don't do pickups. So: laundry in the sink, just like the old days traveling with a team and staying in cheap motels.
Restaurant: soup tepid and light on flavor, with thicker bits not stirred in (fresh out of the can?); pasta meh, nothing great.
I've stayed in hotels all over, and have never had all these problems. At the Grand, in remote Whitley Bay, the manager personally went out and bought a shower stool. At the Athens Gate in Athens: stool, laundry collection. Strand Palace, London: shower stool delivered. Etc.
At Claremont prices...
Nice room, though. read more