Lodging Review: Hilton Prague Old Town
I ended up staying at the Hilton Prague Old Town because I used Priceline to bid on a hotel. I bid $65 for a 5-star hotel in the "East" region, and got this hotel. With taxes and fees, it ended up being $80 a night. When I wanted to extend my stay, I wasn't able to extend through Priceline at the same rate, so used HHonors points for the first night. This worked out well for me, as I was upgraded to Executive Floor because my info was in the system with the HHonors booking, and they let me stay in the room for the next two nights booked through Priceline (which ordinarily disqualifies one for HHonors benefits).
I loved the location of the hotel - it's right next to the sights of Old Town, and basically on top of the Náměstí Republiky metro station where there is also a lot of tram service. It's the kind of place where you can come back to in the middle of a sightseeing day for some rest or snacks, and then go back out for more activities. An airport shuttle right is right outside the front door, in front of the CSA Czech Airlines Office.
The Executive Floors are the top two floors of the hotel, where it starts to slant inwards. They did a nice treatment with the curtains with a bar holding the curtains back.
The bathroom looks like it was renovated, and was nicely done. Not as fancy as the Hilton Warsaw though, as this had the combination shower-tub.
My welcome amenity was two bottles of water, a dish of spiced nuts, and a big fresh fruit platter. The latter two were not replenished, but lasted me through all three days. Though fresh fruit is not as exciting as something local like German chocolate or Polish caramels, I must say it is unbelievably welcome after eating dishes like fried cheese and meat and bread dumplings.
The Executive Lounge was practically next door to my room. It had high and low points about it. The high point was really the personal service, especially the lady who was there in the morning. She not only helped people find a seat, but also made tea and coffee, and helped booked tours, all at the same time. I asked her to book my on the tour of Villa Müller, and a couple days she still remembered my name, greeted me, and asked me if I had done other sightseeing, and shared some insights about the town from a local's perspective.
The downside of the lounge is that it is far too small for the amount of guests, and the buffet area is of a highly impractical design. The first evening I was in town and the first two mornings, I had to share a table with other guests for breakfast. I know this is a "first world problem," but you just wouldn't expect this kind of crowding in the Executive Lounge. When I asked at the front desk if eating in the downstairs restaurant was an option, they said it was a full hotel and the restaurant downstairs would also be very crowded. The buffet area is also of a strange design - it's basically a right angle corner, where only a couple people can stand at one time getting their food. Plus, the coffee and tea machine is not self-serve so the attendants need to be operating it. But it's right next to all of the self-serve food so there's a lot of confusion and crowding.
Here is the one morning when I had a table to myself. I ended up liking the cold items (especially the walnut, cheese and apricot, and poppy seed kolaches!) better than the hot items like sausage.
Evening snacks were decent, not as impressive as the Hilton Warsaw, although probably not many Hiltons will be comparable to the Warsaw one. The Hilton Prague Old Town's main restaurant Zinc seems to have an Asian slant, and so the first day I had snacks in the lounge it was pork and chicken satay, and mini egg rolls. The second day it was egg rolls and samosa-like triangles filled with ground beef and green onions.
I did manage to stop in for tea service one day, and got a slice of cake. I believe it was white chocolate and milk chocolate cake, and it was really one of the best cakes I've ever had! Just barely sweet, it had a very fresh creamy taste.
Service-wise, the front desk staff was adequate, but sometimes the service was perfunctory. Like when I asked for a city map, the clerk was just like "Here" without even opening it up or showing me where the hotel was located on the map. The gym was fine - a nice hotel fitness center with cardio machines, some weight-stack machines, free weights, and rowing machines - and you even had 24-hour access.
I would stay here again if I could get the Priceline rate. The normal rate is in that tough area, where it's a little bit too expensive for my budget, but not so expensive to really justify using HHonors points again if I had the choice - it's in the same HHonors category as many of the London properties as an example, but it's probably half the price as those hotels so a poor-to-fair redemption value.
