Hotel Habakuk — Hotel in Maribor

We had a tournament event for our youngest in Maribor so decided to stay at the Habakuk because of the advertised spa area including sauna world. The location of the hotel is at the outskirts, amidst a lot of green - very nice. Arriving by car we went to the garage immediately - quite huge with several decks, but light, on the other hand, was scarce, which made finding the reception an adventure itself. Check in was smooth, and the room (a junior suite) was basically fine: A sleeping and living area separated by sliding doors, both rooms with enormous amounts of storage facilities. The room and the hotel are kept in a very good state, a lot of areas seem to have gone through renovation rather recently. The balcony stretched across both rooms and was accessible from both, too - nice view, but no chairs or tables there. The living room had a separate toilet, whereas the sleeping room offered the large ensuite bathroom with both a shower and a tub (which was a tad small). Toilet, bidet, and 2 sinks rounded this off. Unfortunately, the bed consisted of two mattresses and two blankets - big minus for us. A pity that there was no free water in the room (that should not be too hard to accomplish tbh). The biggest minus for us, however, was the spa experience - a minus on a high level, though. First of all, it only opens at 11am and you need to go downstairs to the spa area to acquire robes - why the robes are not waiting in the room already is unclear because you can just take them with you after the spa anyway. Second, the sauna area was separated by a practically see-through sliding door from the main pool area, and in there it was apparently expected to be unclad (clear signs with swimsuits crossed out) - with women and men not separated either, and the minimum age being 12 (admittedly, we dont usually care about the latter). This had nowhere been advertised, and it came unexpectedly and is not the way we like to enjoy saunas, to tell the truth. The sauna being one of the main reasons we chose the place somewhat spoiled it for us. We were not the only guests either who were taken by surprise by this. A lot of others refrained from using the sauna area thus. The pool area, on the other hand, was nice - interesting interior design with a lot of nooks and niches, various water temperatures and whirls - nice for relaxation, but not for real swimming. In the evening we had dinner at their restaurant. The wine was underwhelmingly OK (mariage from cabernet and merlot), but the food was a positive surprise. Both the tenderloin and the lamb shank were indeed excellent, great chef. Service was splendid. Breakfast was equally good, which was expected after the dinner - broad range of everything, fresh and tasty. Late checkout was fairly easily negotiated (with the room keycard not reprogrammed, though), and the spa area can be used after checkout, too. Small inconveniences took this review from 5 to 4, but since this is also a subjective opinion, another * taken for the missing sauna info (in which case we would have chosen a different place). For those who don't mind about the sauna and the occasional minor glitch, this place will not give them...

Habakuk was a prophet and what prophets have to say is sometimes difficult to understand. The impression of this hotel is cryptical in a similar way.||In the “Yugoslav” times, hotels where built with the purpose to show the best of architecture and to offer all the splendour to the privileged and the rich to recover glamour and/or foreign currency. The Habakuk was also built in this sense. The long winding underground way from the Parking to the reception is a result of this wish to fit grandiosity into beton, not a precursor of the “time tunnel” concept separating the cold outside from a sunny inner island, which you do not find at the end of the tunnel. ||As Slovenia is on the more prosperous side of the former Yugoslavia, the hotel has benefitted from repairs and renovation, so that there is nothing to complain on this side. But the architectural charme is still more visible to the fans of 1970s Third-Way architecture than to the post-modernists of today.||The grandiosity of those times is most visible in the thermals baths that you can use as a guest of the hotel. This is a pure pleasure - specifically at the end of a cold winter day. But you should not expect today’s high tech arrangements.||The rooms are modernised and there is nothing to say, except that they have the size of the time - means that either you pay for the presidential suite or you are in working class dimensions, vulgo “little people”.||These principles have also inspired the service level. Administrative procedures or restaurant organisation still follow the well-founded processes of the time of construction. Do not expect a cosy place for a romantic breakfast, but it works well if you have to place your troops that have to catch their five busses in time.||So in the end this might be the place where you can meet the dignitaries of the state as well as regular tourists from the local union vacation activity, everyone enjoying a “one size fits all” offer that is a big difference from the individualism of capitalistic countries.||Our experience ended with a somewhat unpleasant note as the price invoiced was then not by room as announced - which would have been reasonable - but by person, which made it quite expensive for the counterpart. Better make sure in advance that your plan and the hotels intentions tie - that was the base of the business fifty years ago and has remained a tradition. Not sure that this was a differentiation from locals to Westeners, but another memory from the policies in place...

We recently stayed at Hotel Habakuk after booking a weekend getaway using Megabon coupons. We were a group of seven—two families (2+2 and 2+1) with three young children (ages 7, 5, and 4). Unfortunately, our experience left us quite disappointed.

Upon arrival, we found that our children's bed hadn’t been set up. When we informed the reception, they assured us a maid would take care of it. However, only one extra bed was provided, leaving our second child to sleep between us. Meanwhile, our friends were upgraded to a suite where their extra bed accommodated two children—meaning they got sleeping arrangements for four, while we, a family of four, got beds for three. When we raised this issue with reception, we were simply told that no additional beds were available, with no apology or attempt to rectify the situation. No mention of the sleeping arangement for the children in the copuon details....

Service throughout our stay was underwhelming. None of the staff smiled or showed any warmth, whether at check-in, check-out, or during our interactions at the bar and restaurant. Speaking of the bar, we ordered a bottle of rosé wine and were first served four glasses of sparkling rosé (sparkling not mentioned on the menu). When we pointed this out, the waiter brought an opened bottle of completely different wine—both in color and taste, again sparkling. To our surprise, we were then billed for both the bottle and the glasses! After some discussion, they agreed to charge only for the glasses, but no one admitted the mistake or offered an apology.

Dining service was also disappointing. Dirty dishes were left on our table throughout dinner and breakfast, leading to a cluttered and unpleasant experience for a group of seven. Gluten-free options were minimal, with only stale, two-day-old bread provided.

Overall, for a 4* hotel that charges around €300 for a stay and 15€/day for parking we expected a much higher level of service and hospitality. Instead, we felt unwelcome and overlooked. It’s a shame, as the location is lovely, but the lack of care from the staff made our visit an unfortunate one. We certainly won’t...