Hotel Ostredok — Hotel in Demänovská Dolina

We chose this hotel for a number of reasons. The first, and probably most compelling, was that it is in the TMR Hotels chain. This means that every member of your party gets a free lift pass and free entry into 2 aquaparks. The hotel on a half board basis was about 1600 euro’s for 4. Given that lift passes and aquapark entry would have been about 1200 euro’s, it’s not hard to see what great value this represented.||Another reason for booking here was that it was advertised as ski in ski out. This was an absolute disappointment because, in truth is is not ski in and is about 500m from the Gondola’s. I hate walking in ski boots, carrying skis and even though this was only a 10 minute walk, I found it a pain. If I stay at Ostredok again, I will hire a ski locker next to the slopes at 10 euro’s per day.||The rooms were clean, spacious and comfortable. The shower was good but had that annoying feature that there was a very fine line between freezing and scalding hot, but once you set the temperature it was nice, with good water pressure.||The staff in the hotel could not do enough to help you. They were all absolutely brilliant. One example was that my sons glasses came loose and we didn’t have a tiny screwdriver. We asked at reception who called the maintenance guy who was at another hotel. He came 10 minutes later and practically refurbished the glasses for us at no cost. We were blown away by how they reacted. Due to not having space in our hand luggage, we hadn’t taken any towels, so when we went to the Aquapark, I asked reception for 4 extra towels. Again, these were supplied immediately at no extra cost.||The spa in the hotel was small but uncrowded. In line with Slovak sauna’s and spa’s it was a strict requirement that you are naked but you are given a sheet which is meant for lying on, to keep sweat off the seats. In reality, most people wore the sheets like a toga or sarong. Nudity does not seem a big thing in central and eastern Europe and almost everyone I’ve spoken to who has braved it says that after the first few minutes of apprehension, you realise that nobody is looking at you, nobody cares and it’s very relaxing and liberating. I’ll be honest, I now hate going in the sauna in my gym, sweating into wet lycra swimming shorts and inhaling chlorine fumes. You only get why the cleanliness of the sauna is so important when you’ve experienced it. Unfortunately, the hot tub part of the spa was broken when we were there so the spa was limited to a steam room, sauna and beds to relax on. My recommendation for enjoying the sauna’s to the max – take a sauna hat, doing this doubles the length of time I can spend in one.||Turning to the food, the breakfast contained really good variety. The coffee was lovely but involved the worlds slowest machine, but that wasn’t a big problem because it seems that Slovak’s are a nation of tea drinkers. There was a massive variety of tea. Don’t expect full English fry ups but there was a huge variety of everything from pastry’s and dough nuts to fruit and cooked breakfast with continental sausage, scrambled eggs etc. There was something for everyone.||It's difficult to score the evening meal. Personally I loved it. But, there was almost no choice. It was a buffet but the only starter was soup. The flavour changed every day and it was delicious. The main course consisted of 6 bain-marie’s. 2 of them had meat in sauce (usually 2 of 3 from chicken, turkey or pork), the others had things like gnocchi, rice, pasta, peppers etc. Again, everything was very very tasty and I really enjoyed it.||Desert was small cakes but there was only ever 1 or 2 choices. Very tasty.||So, in conclusion, what food there was on an evening was plentiful, very tasty and fresh (the bain-maries were small and regularly topped up, so nothing was sat there for hours!), but my criticism that there was almost no choice, and nothing was aimed at a child’s palate which gave me an issue with my beige food fanatic lad.||Overall, this was a great value hotel with excellent staff but there is room for improvement, especially with the choice of...

Summary: Clean, reliable, mostly english speaking staff, simple concept, (every room has) great views of the Low Tatras, 3 minute walk to the closest ski lift, family friendly, separate parking and ski storage room (with ski boot driers also🥰).

.... The pictures are about the restaurant mostly the dinners we had and the plenty breakfast options they offer each day.

We stayed for 5 days and 4 nights between 23' March 23.-27. as a party of 4 18-23y in the 1 bedroom apartment. ....

Some notes/tips/comments if you want to be accomodated here:

+If your room lacks something, reception will most likely have it

+Heating is also controlled from the reception so feel free to ask

-The toilet we had in our room was quite hard to get inside of, quite small, we are skinny but if the door revolved outwards this shouldnt be a problem for anyone.

+We had the chance to have a talk with the owner Paul, he was lovely to talk to and quite knowledgeable about the steps of service, so if something is off I'm more than sure is working on it

+Clean cutlery, whoever is behind cleaning them should be recognised, they are pristine

+They have an indoors children play date room with various toys and that "city rug" I and many of us had growing up.

-Wellness had a price tag 15€/1hr/person with a 2 hour prior notice to heat everything up, but this was probably due to us being the 3rd occupied room in the building so in peak winter season this shouldn't be a problem I hope.

+If you go for the half board option on booking.com your dinners will be either the daily offer that we had (pictures talk for themselves) or if you have dietary restrictions the will adapt a dish to your needs. (So for dinner, a soup, a plentifulmain course and dessert all in HB, you wont be hungry trust me 😋)

+Black gloves for anyone that serves you food, service all in all was professional and up to the standard of what is achievable on the mountains.

+Music was slowed down/not so harsh remixes of popular pop songs, which you could sing along to, but only athmospericly uplifting.

I think we were lucky we got taken care of so much due to the lack of other guests, but I think this concept could work on a full house just as much.

5🌟, no more, no less. We will be back...

Easy to find, there is a sign on the main road just turn right between the hill and the trees. Drive uphill for about 200m and there you are. Car park is limited on the left hand side of the entry road or right hand side just before the hotel. More limited due to the Czech tourists as they park their cars miles apart. Maybe they are all using wheelchairs so I'm not going judge. But as there are steps to the hotel I would say they are not. Reception is on the right side of the main entrance, wellness entry is right next to it. Restaurant is opposite the reception. Be aware there is no lift. Our room was on the second flow and I am sure there is one more above. Room is very big. We had double bed, one single bed and small foldable bed. There is a TV on the wall, desk and chair and inbuilt wardrobe. No fridge or kettle in the room. Bathroom was clean with shower and sink. Now the funny part. Toilet... Very narrow. I had to leave one leg in the room and one behind the toilet to close or open the door. Weird. We had breakfast with our reservation and there was great selection of food. Breakfast starts at 8am finishes at 10am. We were hungry so we ended up eating our dinner there too. This wasn't included so we had to pay for it. Menu is not huge and it is rather expensive. But portions were big. If you are just thirsty or fancy some alcohol enjoy the Bar. I booked wellness where are three saunas. Wet, dry and infrared and jacuzzi which is outside. Now this wasn't mentioned and it is my fault for not asking. You have to pay €15 per person to get in. I thought this is free to use for guests of the hotel. Staff is very nice, friendly and helpful. Would I stay here again? Probably not as I always go by the price of the room. Three of us paid €105 per night but this was quite...