Holiday Inn Express Foshan Nanhai — Hotel in Foshan

Stayed twice in three months - this hotel is an obvious choice for IHG Accelerate bonus and a sound HIE property for the price. ||||Rooms - spacious and clean, but lack fridges. Ice bucket available upon request. Windows can be opened! Internet is just okay - can barely support the 240p filmon streaming of E4. TVB Pearl appeared to be the only English channel available on TV.||||Breakfast - you get what you paid. Self-served wanton/noodles station with a bland soup base. Salad, chopped fruit and cherry tomatoes. That pathetic porridge needed more rice. Hot items dominated by local flavors with a few steamed buns, a couple of pudding/rice spongy cake, fried noodles (this is ok) and fried egg (darker than usual...).||||Restaurant also served lunch at awfully low prices (~RMB20). Not even the photos were appetizing however and there are much better places to fill stomachs.||||Facilities - self-service laundry (did not use) available. A quiet corner on 2/F to hang out with a few magazines but I noticed air-con went off early. Front desk staff mostly polite. Travel goods are sold at font desk, alongside vending machines at lobby.||||Nearby - It is a busier spot with the big mall right next door where you'll find Pizza Hut, ramen, McDonalds, Cafe de Coral, Kung Fu. For grab-and-go and latecomers, RT-Mart supercenter on basement offers cooked food at reduced price after 8pm, and closes at 10:30pm (11pm on weekends). Save the hassle to wrestle with broken English of waiting staff in restaurants too! And of course there's everything you need.||||Location - there's direct China Link bus (中港通) to Hong Kong near the mall but times are awful for visiting (arrive 9pm and depart 7:20am). 3-4 hours each way including waiting time at Shenzhen border-crossing. Alternative departures only leave from Foshan or Guangzhou.||||Outside the mall there are buses go to Guangzhou and Foshan. There is an express service (廣佛快巴) going to the Liuhua (流花) main coach terminal near old Guangzhou railway station for RMB6 with comfy tourist coach seating. Not that express actually - traffic jam in Guangzhou means travel time often exceed 45 mins.||||Commuter buses route 2 or 3 head to the nearest Guangzhou metro station of Jiaokou. Without traffic the bus journey took about half an hour (Dec) - it took about 1 hour 15 minutes to reach hotel from TianHe district. It was the good time.||||Then there were bad times. It took me over an hour because of roadworks in Sep. The entire journey from the TaiKoo pier/wharf area to hotel took nearly two hours. Road traffic around Foshan can get intense with all the factories and wholesale markets along the trunk road. Buses can get crowded most of the times. ||||Express bus runs till around 8-9pm. Commuter buses run till around 10pm. ||||This is a decent, sound HIE that may work for weekend sightseeing in Foshan or Guangzhou (particular the older parts), but not an efficient base for business visitors esp during...

Let me talking about what I have experienced at this property:||||1- all the English Channel on the TV it's not working or they don't have it at all.||2- no mini bar in the room.||3- the room service should to be 24 hours but they're not.||4- I can't ask for make up my room after 5PM.||5- nobody can speaking english just a few words.||6-no upgrade even they have another kind of room.||.||||And the good things is:||||1- sleep quality it's nice.||2-breakfast it's good.||3-the staff helpful at night shift only.||4-the location it's ok.||5-the...

Ok, so been here many time in the past 4 years, I think it's time to change the hotel, mind you the room is still decent but needs attention as carpets toilets etc are abused. ||The main thing that put me off is that now there are now English channels on TV, when I called to ask reception they said they cannot get any English channels, which was a lie since a meters away is harbour hotel and has at least one channels that I know of. ||Breakfast is worse here than before, I recall this hotel full of Germans now...