[Review] Barcelo Sants Hotel, Barcelona, Spain

This was one of the hotels I stayed in during my semi-business trip to Europe Mediterranean (France, Spain, Monaco, Portugal) August last year. This hotel is located in Barcelona, precisely just on top of Sants metro station, so it is very convenient to travel around Barcelona using metro. Moreover, it is just 4 minutes walk to Catalunya Square, one of the top attractions in Barcelona.

What I love about the hotel is the room! The hotel adopts the futuristic-style, so every room and every inch of the hotel are designed futuristically.  The hotel's facilities and amenities are very complete, and they even provide wi-fi in room! (which is very rare as most hotels in Europe only provide wi-fi in the lobby area). There is even a minibar inside the room!

 

The hallway and the door to the room

The breakfast is also delicious. A typical buffet of European-American dishes, but the varieties are superb! This was where I was first introduced to tortilla (Spanish Omelet), which made me addicted!

[Review] Golden Rose Hotel, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

I am in the mood of writing now, so I will review one hotel in Ho Chi Minh City, where I stayed on my trip to Vietnam May last year. This hotel is located in District 3, and is quite close to War-Remnants Museum and Reunification Palace.

The hotel's name is Golden Rose hotel, and it's quite new. We booked the Premium Deluxe Twin Room for 2 nights stay through agoda.com. The price is reasonable, about US$50 per night, including breakfast. Although the room is a little bit small, but the amenities in this room are great. The bathroom is modern and quite spacious, and provide cold as well as warm water. The bed is comfortable and the air-con works well. 

Breakfast is wonderful, it is a mix of American and Asian buffet. The drawback is that the location is quite far from district 1, where all major attractions and shopping center are located. Although we can walk, it takes about 20 minutes to district 1, and since we are always in a hurry we have to take a taxi. Taxi fare from this hotel to district 1 is about 20.000-35.000 dong. Staffs do not speak fluent English, especially the female ones. Sometimes it is hard to understand what they are saying, but they are very friendly and they are trying really hard to help us in finding the way and other stuffs.

[Review] YWCA Fort Canning Lodge, Singapore

This hotel is located just in front of Fort Canning Park, and behind Park Mall in the Orchard vicinity. It takes about 5-7 minutes to walk to Dhoby Gaut MRT (by shortcut through Park Mall's parking lot), which is the interchange station for 3 lines, green, purple, and yellow. And to Plaza Singapura, it takes about 10-15 minutes walk.So, it is very convenient from here to start exploring the city, as well as to go shopping :)

To go to Dhoby Gaut Station, you need to go to Park Mall's parking lot, which is located on the left side of the hotel, and find an elevator there. Go to the 1st floor, and you will come up inside Park Mall. Go out from the mall, and you will have to cross the road, and voila! The station is just in front of you! To go to Plaza Singapura, just cross the road one more time, go left and you will see the mall. On the way back, do the same, but this time, you have to go to the 4th floor using the elevator. If you are confused, ask the front office or the security guard, and they will explain it to you clearly.

We booked the Standard Twin Room through agoda.com, and we were assigned to the room in the 5th floor. The check-in staff served us politely and efficiently. The room itself is not really big, but it is more than enough for the two of us to put our 2 luggage and to wander around the room. The bathroom is not big, but efficiently designed. And I just love the water pressure, nice and strong flow of warm water!