Friday 4 August 2017

Try to make refundable hotel bookings and a rather "meh" stay at The St Regis Rome

Tiny Rooms are not enjoyable

Good breakfast is the redeeming feature

Stayed Oct 2016


After a brief stay at Bucharest, I arrived in Rome to fulfil one of my childhood dreams.

Other than the Acropolis in Athens, the Colosseum was another of the images in the encyclopaedia I read as a child.

But the journey there wasn't smooth.

A few weeks before the trip, I received an email that my flight from Bucharest to Rome was cancelled and I had been rescheduled on the flight on the next day!



Thankfully my booking was made with points at the Sheraton Rome and I cancelled that booking closer to departure.

So there was no harm done, except a shorter time in Rome and a longer stay in Bucharest.

Arriving safely at the Rome airport, I took the airport train ( I still remember someone left a funny comment on how I was taking the metro to luxury hotels.) to the central station and walked to the hotel which was a short but significant distance away.

As usual, the staff at the entrance gave me weird looks as I didn't 'arrive in style' but were nonetheless helpful when I entered. Unlike a certain Waldorf.

Exterior

Entrance

A Landmark Hotel!

Fountain beside the Hotel


The hotel was still undergoing renovations at that time and it affected the front desk, so the experience of checking in wasn't too great.




Checking in was uneventfully, and I was upgraded to a larger room. Having read up on the hotel, suite upgrades are pretty rare.

Corridors


The upgraded room was still really quite small to say the least, and I shudder to think how the basic room is like! Especially at a rate of 300 Euro per night.

Rome is indeed expensive!


Complimentary Biscuits 




View from Room

After settling in the room, I took a walk around the hotel noting some interesting decorations as well as an ancient lift.

Ancient Lift

Spa!






Ceiling Art

Even the toilet has sculptures. OMG.


Breakfast was served at the restaurant off the lobby and looked really grand and pompous.

The chandeliers, wall and ceiling art made one feel so narcissistic. -laugh-










The food display was really good and I guess it should rightfully be for that nightly rate, and there was a lot of space to move around during breakfast.

No jostling with other guests for food and space.

Checking out was easy and I felt really claustrophobic inside the room.

Otherwise, the location of the hotel was good, with easy walks to good restaurants and some central Roman attractions, including the Trevi Fountain











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