Wednesday, November 15, 2006

The worst $100 hotel

We went to Yellow Mountain (Huangshan) last weekend and stayed at a hotel on top of the mountain. The room cost around $100 per night, by far the most we've paid to stay anywhere in China. Given the location we weren't expecting it to be quite as nice as the Crown Plaza in Beijing ($55/night) but we were expecting it to be nice.

The room itself was like any room we've paid $15 to stay in elsewhere. The bed linens were clean, but not much else. It only cost $1 per hour for cleaning, so you would think that once a month or so they could wash the smashed bugs off the wall. How does a ceiling get dirty anyway?

If it couldn't be clean at least the staff could be friendly, right? Even Andrew didn't get great treatment here.

Finally, we only got 3 hours of hot water and heat a night. I may be a spoiled American, but for that kind of money I want a hot shower whenever. (Of course, like every other hotel room in China, the drains were backed up so when I did get my shower the bathroom flooded.)

I will give a thumbs up to the view from our room. We were lucky enough to have an East facing room so the view at sunrise was incredible. Since we hadn't had heat since 9:00 pm the night before even our room was chilly, but at least we didn't have to stand out on the breezy patio with the chain smoking Chinese tour groups to watch the sunrise.

Overall, I give a thumbs down to the White Goose (Bai e) hotel at Huangshan. There has got to be a nicer place to stay.

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