Guanfang Hotel Lijiang Garden Villa — Attraction in Lijiang City

After reading some of the reviews on Trip Advisor, I admit I was a bit skeptical about staying here for 3 nights. However, we liked the hotel. We had a large room with a huge bathroom with a separate bathtub and shower. Don't think our room had been used for a while but that was easy to remedy....we simply aired it out and purchased some incense in Lijiang the next morning to burn the 2nd night.||||We enjoyed all the space with its large bed and desk with lots of room for our carryon luggage (we always travel light). We used the laundry service and were happy. We ate breakfast with the Chinese tour groups (and didn't see any other guests but Chinese on a couple of the mornings) and enjoyed it. The Chinese typically get up early and eat fast, so we got up early too.||||The grounds are nice with gardens and wonderful views of the mountains. Even though the hotel is not in the center of Lijiang, we found taxis to be cheap....from the center of town to the hotel, it cost us about 15 to 20 RMB on 2 separate occasions or around $3 at today's exchange rate. TIP: If you don't speak the language, always take the business card of the hotel when you leave to go out for the day. You can simply present that to the taxi driver. We also memorized the hand gestures for a few basic numbers so we could negotiate fares that way since our two taxi drivers didn't use a meter.||||Staff at the Front Desk were all helpful, and we enjoyed sitting in the lobby to use the internet connection, etc.||||We recommend this hotel because we like having space, enjoy walking on a hotel property, and got a kick out of our breakfasts here. We had a very late dinner when we arrived, which took some negotiation because we arrived at the restaurant just before it closed. They accommodated us with a smile, so we ate quickly to return the favor.||||This is not a 5-star experience but we liked the hotel and would stay here again. We especially enjoyed being around the Chinese tour groups even though my husband and I were traveling on our own. When we visited China for the first time in 1986, there were hardly any Chinese tourists at all, so it was wonderful to see the Chinese traveling just as we do, enjoying Lijiang and the...

This hotel had the basics to become a very good hotel as it was very well located and it occupies quite a big area. It is only about 10 mins walk to the Ancient Town area. The hotel offers one of the best views of the Snow Dragon Mountain from the upper floors (since Lijiang is quite a low-rise city due to government regulations). However, the issues are mainly:||||1) It is very cold - the air-conditioning system is very weak which means that there is very little heating, making this not a recommended place to stay at during the winter. The hotel staff confessed as much.||||2) the food is poor especially the breakfast. We were told on both of the days we were there that they had not received the eggs delivery and so there were no eggs. The breakfast was quite bad generally.||||We paid 400RMB per night per twin room 26-28 December 2015 (paid via Ctrip). There were also very few visitors and the hotel is generally very empty with more staff than guests. Decor of the rooms is ok but the lack of heating / a decent air-conditioning system is a massive turn-off. Even the taxi driver who took us to the hotel said that this hotel has the reputation for being the worst 5-star hotel in Lijiang. He was right - it was more like a 3* hotel.||||On the plus, WIFI...

From the exterior, the estates look quite interesting. We were first arrived at the lobby area and then we were transported over to our villa via a golf cart. Each villa has about 4 rooms and comes with a Guan Jia (housekeepr). Our guan jia is a young Naxi lady. She was very attentive and well-mannered. We flew in pretty late and probably way past her bedtime, but she made sure we were settled in. We were housed on the 3rd floor. The room seemed a bit run down and was quite small. I was a bit short of breath after showering due to the slightly higher elevation of 2200 in Lijiang. But I was able to sleep. We woke up to a table covered with freshly prepared breakfast. The guanjia wakes up early to fry eggs, heat up congee, prepare sausage and bacon, boil coffee, warm up milk, stir fries veggies, and provides a plate of buns and pastries. The villa is located in the outskirts of town though. The living room and kitchen is located on the ground floor with quite a homey feel. The surrounding areas with bridges and flowers and the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain as the backdrop was more impressive than the actual room itself. However, the service provided was excellent. Our guanjia offered us fruit and brought warm milk up to our rooms. It was a pleasant...