Darrell M.
Yelp
We spent 8 nights at Hotel Cler in mid May 2018. The hotel is situated on Rue Cler (street), on which pedestrians, a few cars, delivery trucks, scooters and bicycles share the roadway. It is lined for several blocks with classic Parisian bistros, markets offering wonderful fruit, vegetables, meats, cheeses, wine, sweets and more sweets. Sundries are available across the narrow street; a laundry a block away. Pizza and traditional American sandwiches are available across from the laundry. Clothing and book shops are nearby, the post office two blocks away, and an ATM next door. The Taxi stand and Metro (subway) are three blocks away. It is centrally located to numerous top tourist sites. In other words, the location is very hard to beat. Our room, which had to accommodate 3 adults (a single bed and a double bed), was quite small - as is the case with many types of spaces that have been fitted into the century-plus aged buildings of central Paris. Our room on the 4th floor was accessed by 72 steps on a spiral staircase or a very compact (don't breathe in) elevator that was efficient though it required a pass key to operate. The room was equipped with the usual hotel accompaniments, and kept tidy by unobtrusive daily staff cleaning. It is a recently refurbished hotel, so it was clean and modern. It is not the Four Seasons, but the price was not at that level either; reasonable for the positives it offered. The hotel offers a breakfast (12 euros per person when we visited) that is on par with the options available across the street at the restaurant Le Petit Cler. Dining is indoors or, weather permitting, in an inviting adjacent open area between the surrounding buildings. The hotel is very secure, as one leaves the room key at the check in desk when one leaves and retrieves it on return. A safe is in each room. The check-in desk is staffed round the clock, without fail in our varied comings and goings. The staff was uniformly competent in English, and exceedingly patient with our well intended but tragic mispronunciation of the French language. Idir (pronounced Ee-dee) was particularly helpful and engaging. From recommendations for restaurants to help with daily logistics, he was always happy to assist and did so with a quick sense of humor and a strong knowledge of what tourists will need when they come to his hotel. While a hotel alone cannot by itself make a trip a success, it can nearly do the opposite. It is the home base to which one returns after the day's discoveries. A tired traveler wants some comfort, security, television (we watched BBC for news; French channels to pick up a little language skill), and good beds. The single bed was a bit small for the one of us that used it, but we wanted to take the larger bed home with us. Our looked out intothe open space four floors above the outdoor dining area, contained by the surrounding apartment buildings. The windows had no screens, so one would need to keep small children well in hand. But we slept with windows open slightly and were given a 4:00 a.m. serenade by a local bird each morning. Not a loud serenade, more like a morning flute solo to let one know that the day was coming and that dreams should be moving toward conclusion. Still, we managed to sleep until 7 or 8 a.m. after going to sleep at 9:30 or 10 p.m. So the bird's song was more like the intermission before the final act than a ten minute snooze alarm. This was our first trip to Paris and the surrounding region. It was thoroughly enjoyable, and the Hotel Cler was a significant factor in making it so.
