Kingsgate Hotel Autolodge Paihia — Hotel in Bay of Islands-Whangaroa Community

This place reminds me of your stereotypical American motel, It has two buildings facing each other with two floors. The top do have balconies looking at each other and into the car park. There are some rooms which do face towards the ocean but there is a very small number of these rooms. This hotel is placed beautifully right on the seafront so when you come out of reception you are looking at the spectacular ocean views across the bay of Islands and it is also almost smack in between the supermarket and the ferry to go across to Russell Island (also where the main road/town is). There is also the swimming pool at the front but when I was passing in front of the swimming pool I noticed you could very clearly hear the gym from right besides you, so I'm not sure if some of the doors at the front of the building open up between the gym and pool? The pool is heated and other people that I was staying with agreed that they could hear the generator noise throughout the day which only gets switched off at around 21:00, we do believe that this was the heating for the pool as the times that the noise was present was when the pool was able to be accessed, this was a bit of a bug bear going along all day and would have become quite frustrating if we'd have stayed that much longer. The main reason I've dropped q point is because of the actual hotel rooms. For starters, the area where you place your suitcase part of it was dropping down which made me worried as if I had of placed my fairly heavy suitcase on this then it may have broken. I also found that the shower head had an awful lot of lime scale on it. The lights in the hallways were never switched off and all of the doors are not fire doors so had gaps around all of the edges meaning that all night you could see the glow from outside coming in and you could actually even see outside using the edges of the door due to them being fairly wide gaps, this was quite a problem for me as I do need complete darkness to sleep. Just a personal suggestion, but I really would have appreciated it if they had some form of hanging line on the balcony out front as my laundry which I'd done had to be hung over the railings which was fine as I do carry pegs but I would have preferred to have had some sort of line outside to hang this on. If I remember rightly then they did have a laundry line in the bathroom but I just have a preference to it being outside if possible as I like it being dried in the air and also the heat up there would have dried it a lot quicker then just in a bathroom. The breakfast selection here was fairly good and your typical hotel buffet breakfast spread and was completed upstairs just above the reception. I was very appreciative that they had different milks available and they also had a really good selection of different fruit juices and the best fruit selection I had in any of my hotels during my holiday (9 hotels!). The reception was well staffed and does have both stairs and ramp and does accommodate to people using wheelchairs. Silly little thing but I did really like that in the rooms fridge they gave you a small carton of milk instead of those tiny little pots of milk, most hotels give you those little pots and I need at least four of them to actually make a drink whereas with this tiny little carton I could actually have enough drinks using it. Overall this hotel was mostly clean and was fairly comfortable, my main let downs was the glow around the door affecting my sleep and the noise during the day from the generator. If you are able to sleep with the additional light and are not going to be in most of the day then this hotel is beautifully placed at an absolutely gorgeous area right in the...

We stayed 2 nights at this motel during a month of travels around NZ. It was our least favourite. We booked the trip about 18 months before travelling and were originally booked to stay in the Sea Spray Suites but our agent changed our booking to this motel about a month before we travelled, something about room availability there. We didn't dispute the change however, as our booking showed as being allocated a Junior Suite - Waterfront at the Kingsgate, and this time breakfast was included, so it looked promising for a nice stay over Valentine's Day.|When we arrived we had been allocated a ground floor "King" room (419), looking into the central parking courtyard, and straight at the cars parked outside our window, so no sea view at all. We queried this with reception who advised that they were fully booked and that this category was what our agent had booked. To be fair to the hotel, our agent confirmed she had made a mistake with the booking, so it was not the hotel's fault, but do double check that you are booked into the type of room you are expecting, as our room felt dark and miserable, although the facilities within it were fine and unlike another recent reviewer, we had no issues with the plumbing.|The hotel itself is nicely located, and if you did have a waterfront room I think it would make a big difference. We only got to enjoy that view at breakfast. However the dining room itself really was 70s motel style - long tables set up for coach parties (3 coaches staying whilst we were there!) and it felt more like a school dining hall. The breakfast itself matched that style - a range of tinned typed fruits in large plastic trays, cereal and basic hot items. Uninspiring, so although it was included in our rate it was disappointing.|We didn't see anyone using the pool out front and we didn't have time to try it so I'm not sure if it was heated or not.|I don't know what we paid for this motel as it was part of a package via an agent, but I would only stay here again if I got a very cheap deal and a seafront room - and would probably bypass the breakfast offering and find something amongst the cafes in town (just a few minutes walk). Charlotte's Kitchen served us a wonderful Valentine's dinner on their terrace on the jetty (within site of the hotel) so that at least cheered us up after we arrived - would recommend...

Do not be deceived by the website and photos! This place is horridly run down and seriously outdated, not just physically, but the staff too.

Firstly, the website looks like a flash place, nice views from any room available, pool and games room... WRONG. The room has a view of a carpark, so you have to keep curtains drawn for privacy (which the curtain - yes, one single curtain - doesn't cover the window properly).

The room had an awful smell. The condition was sad, peeling paint, damaged walls, shotty wiring. The TV had about 3 semi-working channels and the rest was static.

House keeping had clearly done the bare minimum as complimentary items had been thrown onto surfaces rather than displayed.

The "games room" was very run down and outdated. There is one ping pong ball available for both foosball and table tennis, and it has a dent in it. And don't be fooled, pool is not available unless you have a $2 coin per game. Don't bother asking reception for cash out for coins to play pool, they'll respond rudely like it's your fault for not carrying cash and refuse to help.

The "hotel pool" is accessible from the road and clearly used by people not staying at the hotel and isn't monitored by hotel staff. It was roudy and there were intimidating individuals that make the whole experience uncomfortable. Basically you will feel trapped inside your room to feel safe, and even then, that's IF your hotel door locked behind you properly because half the time it doesn't lock behind you and can be opened whenever.

To add insult to injury, offering any form of constructive feedback to the hotel will be met with an eyeroll and a "can't be bothered" attitude from the duty manager.

I am absolutely disgusted by the staff's demeanour and attitudes, the condition of the property itself, and it's blatant false advertising on it's website. I feel cheated that I can't get my money back from this...