Maurice W.
Yelp
First impressions from the outside and arriving do not match the photos on the website. It is a hidden gym, their sign is covered by ivy therefore if you blink you'll miss it and if you are using navigation you'll hear the voice tell you "rerouting".
Upon check in, the lobby is small yet quaint and the desk staff is extremely friendly. Very pleasant.
The establishment is much smaller than expected, however the rooms are much larger than expected.
They have VOSS water in the room which is a nice touch, however they charge you $5 for the larger bottle, $3 for the smaller one. They are the plastic VOSS bottles not the glass, you can scoop up a four pack of the small bottles at Albertson's with your member card for about $7. Take your own water, the rooms have mini fridges.
Suites are carpeted, standard rooms are not, therefore make sure you have sandals unless you're fine walking barefooted on tile throughout. Careful as I slipped and fell out of the shower in the room. The shower floors are textured the room floors are not.
Speaking of the shower, there is no shower door, just a half glass wall therefore making it somewhat difficult to bath as you're afraid the water angle of the shower head depending on your height will spray past the half wall and out of of the shower onto the floor also posing a slip risk.
They are relatively low tech, in a sense there are no digital keys and no key cards, its all physical key. Two guests in a room? One key vs each party receiving their own key card. Careful when exiting your room as the door will Auto Unlock, therefore if you close the door its not always going to be locked. You need to turn the knob on the back and double check each time because you could leave your door unlocked. And with no room safe, valuables are not secure.
WiFi signal strength in room is excellent and quick, certain areas around the compound will affect signal strength, at times it was easier to be on my phones LTE/4G network than remain connected to the hotels WiFi.
Though big, the bed was okay, but the pillows were lumpy. Each room only has one bed there are no twins, etc therefore if you're rooming with friends, you're sharing a bed.
They charge a daily Resort Fee, yes sadly those pesky resort fees, however, there's no gym, no spa/massage services, no continental breakfast, theres no conference room, theres only one computer, no in room safe, no electronic key, therefore the resort fee is a little erroneous.
Sadly in the United States, the legality of charging resort fees has been a decades-long issue of contention. Currently there is no U.S. law that allows for hotels to charge mandatory fees in addition to their base room rate. However, there is also no law banning this practice. I digress.
The "pastries" are nothing more than plain mini croissants, there was the occasional chocolate chip filled croissant but those were smaller than the plain mini croissants, they put out jelly and butter. There's a microwave in the lobby area if you wish to warm something up.
They provide coffee as well as decaf, however they do not provide cream. The coffee was over brewed and strong as 97 octane. Like your coffee on the lighter side? Milk only folks. Yes, you read that correctly, theres no cream, not even powdered. So for you avid coffee drinkers, its black only if you're lactose intolerant.
The espresso is not an espresso machine as one would think, they have a machine smaller than a Keurig and it uses pods. With a daily resort fee and daily room tax which is higher than sales tax one would think the quality of both the coffee and the espresso would be of a higher caliber.
The pool is nice, however, there was only one mister, the other misters were in the restaurant. That posed an interesting situation as you're moist and humid while trying to dine. Air conditioning would have been a better option than placing a ton of misters in an inclosed environment. It would have also been nicer to have the misters poolside as you are already getting wet. Just my two cents.
Parking spaces are small, therefore if you have a midsize sedan or larger search for a corner spot, you SUV and van owners, you'll poke out and you'll need guidance swinging in and pulling out of spaces. They have nice landscape in the parking areas, however, their trees drop leaves and drip some sort of sticky substance so expect your vehicle to be covered with both. Its unavoidable and the trees do provide some shade for your vehicle interior but theres the trade off.
All in all the stay wasn't unpleasant, however, for the amount paid for what you got, I was hoping a bit more oomph especially when being charged a resort fee.
_S.jpg "Alcazar Palm Springs by null")
_S.jpg "Alcazar Palm Springs by null")
