Alice T.
Yelp
Fantastic hotel conveniently located in the buffer zone in Penang.
The staff here is amazing. They remembered us despite have 40+ rooms in the building, and even stored our luggage while we took a 3-day trip out of town.
The hotel and rooms are very modern and clean. The bed was extremely comfortable with soft sheets. The bathroom had a modern egg-like toilet with plenty of amenities if you happened to forget something at home. The room was so pleasant that we kind of felt bad for lounging in our room instead of going out to explore Penang in the blistering heat.
The location is convenient, and there is a mall across the street, a night market a block away, and one of the most popular restaurants (Tek Sen) only a few blocks away. I found that staying in the buffer zone, rather than the core zone, was better, because you got the benefits of plenty of restaurants and shops while only being less than 10 mins away from the old heritage buildings. The core zone, while closer to the heritage buildings, had less around in terms of entertainment or restaurants. We signed up for the city bike program (LINK) for less than 2RM a day and rode a bike around town.
The thing that sets Le Dream apart from all other hotels (and why it's #1 on Tripadvisor) is all the freebies! They have a packed itinerary of events with free stuff all day long:
- Breakfast from 7:30-10:30am. This is a full breakfast buffet with prepared hot foods, breads, cereals, fruits, salads, and even made-to-order items such as eggs, roti canai, roti forgot-the-name (roti that stands up in a cone-shape and is drizzled with condensed milk!), char koay teow, and a daily soup noodle.
- Delicious ginger ale-type drink in the lobby all afternoon
- Afternoon tea from 3:30-5pm with traditional Nyonya snacks, candies, and noodles
- Complimentary cookies, ice cream, and snacks from 5pm-midnight. Movie every night with popcorn starting at 8:30pm. They play Hollywood movies that are somewhat recently released, like The Mummy (2017 version), Pitch Perfect 3, and Suicide Squad.
- Free wine from 6-7pm
There's also two jacuzzis and one small gym at the hotel. A great experience, and I'm really glad we stayed here to recharge during our trip.