We made a last-minute decision to overnight in Hico after seeing the hotel and deciding the town was worth hanging around in till the next day. They had two rooms open that night: a king room was on an interior side of the large upstairs hallway and had no exterior windows. Thus, we chose a double-queen corner room with several windows, the only other available spot.
First, the hotel is beautiful. The renovations are tasteful and elegant. Super-high ceilings and windows make the lobby, upstairs hallways, and rooms feel very spacious. In fact, the public spaces are so cavernous and sparsely furnished that they make a person feel isolated, despite the presence of a few chairs and tables throughout. The owners should do more to scale down the spaces, especially upstairs, and create some intimate areas for relaxing.
Our room was quite large. It had a good seating area with a fold-out sofa, armchair, and coffeemaker. The main part of the room held two queen beds, one night table, an armchair, an armoire with hanging space, and a small TV. The bathroom was nicely appointed and roomy enough, although I'm surprised the owners went with a standard-size bathtub.
Despite the size of the room, however, there was no room for night tables on the wall sides of each bed, leaving only the nightstand in the middle for a water cup, book, reading glasses, and a place to rest your phone. The owners should squeeze in a couple of small nightstands on the empty side of each bed. It would also be good to make the electric outlets more accessible, as many new hotels do these days.
Pros: the beds were firm and even, the bedding was plentiful, and there were four pillows per bed. The thermostat and ceiling fan kept the room comfortable. Hot water did not run out after two showers, and the bath towels were big and fluffy. The wifi was strong but required no password; I hope it was on a secure router.
Cons: as mentioned, the only nightstand was between the two beds, and it was a tight squeeze even to walk on the outer sides of each bed. The owners could place a smaller table in the middle in order to leave room for a small table and more walking space on each side. The thin shades on the huge windows hardly blocked out any light. The TV was way too small -- maybe 24 inches -- to watch comfortably from bed, and you'd have to move the armchairs to sit closer to it. A hotel of this calibre and a room this large should have a larger TV. The cable package was huge -- too huge, as it included several channels with "adult" content. I thought good hotels stopped that nonsense years ago; this is certainly not family friendly. The bathroom lacked water cups; we had to use coffee cups that were found next to the coffeemaker. And let's just go ahead and say this: the toilet paper was the flimsiest I've seen in a nice place.
The in-room Keurig coffeemaker had just one each of regular and decaf, plus a mystery pod that had come unwrapped. There was one regular teabag and one decaf teabag (not Keurig cups), some Sweet-n-Low (no other sweetener variety), and a couple of creamer packets. If two people each wanted a cup of any of these offerings, too bad. And there was no night staff at the desk, and no apparent self-service to replenish the stock. Adding to the coffee woes: when we checked in, I asked about breakfast and was told that the in-hotel restaurant doesn't serve it, but the clerk said "we put out pastries." Well, next morning, there were no pastries, and not even a selection of coffee, tea, and cocoa downstairs for guests. No staff were on hand to greet guests. When any roadside hotel offers at least that much these days, I'd expect a hotel striving for grandness to do the same. At least, they should put out a variety of morning coffee, cocoa, and tea in the lobby. (The night manager saw me and provided a cup for me, but he was just being friendly as he was leaving the building.)
The website mentions a bellman to help carry luggage up the high, broad stairs. When we checked in, we were pointed to such a fellow; however, when we came in with our bags, he had vanished, and we were on our own. We travel with camera gear and computers plus personal bags, so a little help would have been nice.
In short, the hotel felt like an afterthought to the in-house restaurant. Improvements to what are nowadays standard amenities would go a long way to making this a return destination. read more