Morey L.
Yelp
The TLDR is this place that is overpriced. It's a motel with slightly nicer than average rooms and a great view. If I had paid half the price for this room, I woulden't have had a complaint (well I would have but not enough to write a review).
Let's start with the good:
The Location is fantastic. A block from pink jeeps, right in the heart of the tourist area. A few minutes to several restaurants and cafes.
The view is stellar. We had a second-level suite (which is really a larger room with a pull-out couch) and a first-level room. The room's view was great and the suite's view was stunning. This is what you are paying for. If you are fine with that go ahead and book this hotel
The rooms were pretty nice. They were clean and spacious, and all had balconies with views. They could use a little updating, maybe a paint job. And I did find a cobweb in a nook in the bathroom.
The not so good:
None of these are deal-breakers. They only perturbed me because we spend 1000+ a night.
They appeared to be suffering a staff shortage (presumably from covid) so perhaps this was a one-off issue, but again for a hotel with luxury prices and very few amenities you would think they could pay people enough to keep staffing up.
The exterior of the hotel looks like a motel so just be aware of that.
When we arrived around 3:00 the lobby was locked and a sign told us we needed to drive a few minutes to their sister's property, the much nicer la'berge, (there is also a stairway between the properties but we didn't know that) to check-in. A minor inconvenience but again strange for the price (and they could have sent an email or something).
What was really annoying was the keys they handed us didn't work, and when we called the la'berge they told us they can't make keys after 4:00 (why?) so whenever we wanted to get back into our room the first night we had to call down and have them send up maintenance from the la'berge which took about 15 minutes).
Housekeeping only comes if you request it. Not a big deal, but they didn't tell us so we missed the first day of it.
Clearly, someone had decided to prioritize the more expensive la'berge over the still very expensive Orchard Inn. None of this was the staff's fault. They were as helpful as they could be. Someone in management messed up.
The final oddity was the "amenity fee". They tacked on a $20 a night/a room amenity fee which paid for the wifi, parking, water bottles, and "breakfast" (yogurt, fruit, coffee and tea, prep-packaged muffins and pastries. Skip the latter I bit into a danish the was fully dough). Considering most motels I have stayed in include all of those things (except water) for free, despite the relatively low price, having already paid 1,000 a night It felt like I was being nickeled and dimed
To sum up, there is nothing especially wrong with this hotel except the price. Unless you are willing to pay for the view and nothing else, book a motel. You will get the same experience for half the price.