Kensington Hotel Seorak — Hotel in Sokcho-si

Great view in catastrophic Hotel.

Our visit was in May 2019 booked in a traditional Korean room with mountain view (305)

Positive: great view (in the right rooms) and plentiful breakfast (tasty and rather fresh, much to choose from), has own parking place.

The rest is bad...

The whole area of this hotel plays day and night very loud and distorted piano music, rouning the nature around. The building itself looks nice but on closer inspections you see it is build in at least the 70ies and got never renovated, only overprainted. In front of the hotel is a huge red London bus. The lobby looks like a queen museum but instead of fresh flowers they are all plastic and the whole lobby is flavoured with a heavy and old parfume. On first view all the memorabilia looks nice but never inspect too closely. In the lobby itself plays an automated piano, also very loud and a bit off tuned with some delays as well. The elevators are very old and every alley has the same old parfume stink as the lobby. You can take the stairs as well but no one knows who or what died in there and only very strong will let you breathe in here.

To our room. Starting with the shower/restroom. No water pressure tiles are skew mounted and the "glue" is missing on some. Hair dryer was a model from early nineties with no air pressure at all, the ceiling had cracks, there was a service door in the ceiling and half of the locks open (could have fallen on our head), the silicone was applied badly and therefore the shower not water tight. WC with skew mounted seat and no bidet (IN KOREA!!!).

The room itself. Stinks, refrigerater at least 20 years old and with a noise like a jet engine, housed in wood so it could not cool and therefore got even louder. The air conditioning system was of the childhood days of the Queen... It had summer, winter and three fan speeds. A lever for a number between 60-90. It was in wain to change anything, because nothing changed but the fan noise and we had to sleep in a room with about 30°C (outside was 24 and we wanted it to be between 20-24) and awful loud playing music from the lobby and the parking lot.

If you want to eat dinner or lunch here, normal prices for one person start from 55.000 Won. In Sokcho (10km) you can even get tasty Korean or European food for two people for 16.000 Won (Matsu)... But...

This is my favorite hotel where I definitely stay when I go to Seoraksan Mountain.I don't think there is a hotel near Seoraksan Mountain that is as good as this price.The facilities are old and outdated, but the hotel seems to be maintaining them consistently. First of all, the view from the room, whether it's snowy mountains or autumn leaves, is so beautiful that I ate more than half of the meal just by looking at it. That's my opinion. Although the facility is old, I personally like it because the overall British style is both antique and retro.We also enjoyed afternoon tea and brunch at the lounge cafe.I also had coffee, and it tasted good, so I think it's great value for money. Even on days when I wasn't staying here, I would stop by and enjoy afternoon tea when I was nearby. If you stay here, you get a discount coupon, so it couldn't be better than this. All the staff were friendly. Also, the omelettes at the breakfast restaurant are delicious. I always eat breakfast here because I remember the omelets being delicious from long ago. The view from the breakfast room is also really nice. However, if there's one thing that's disappointing, it's not a bad idea to keep the old one, but since the bathroom mirror is so old, it's stained or cloudy, so it doesn't look clean, and the water pressure in the toilet isn't that strong. Also, there was a smell of cigarette smoke in the hotel hallway, as if someone was smoking in the room (actually, this was the guest's fault), but it was convenient that the convenience store that used to be outside was moved inside (there are not many items for sale, but it still seems to have all the necessities). Above all, it is very convenient when returning from hiking. Another advantage is that even if you park at the hotel and walk down the mountain, you can quickly come back and wash up since the hotel is a waste.I think I will come here often in the future when I want to see the scenery of Mt. Seorak without having to climb the mountain. I was satisfied...

About the most kitsch experience one can wish for in a hotel stay. Korean conveying British taste and culture to the extreme, including paddington bears, a massive two story red bus, vintage imported furniture to fandom of the Royal Family and Princess Diana covering the walls of The Queen dining hall. All, bizarrely set in a remote hotel in the heart of the Seroak national park, close to the cable car.

It would have been perfectly fun and peculiar but furniture, carpets and wallpaper in the room was very worn, even torn, and cleaningness was slightly deficient, so you can smell humidity and the years. Hotel rooms would do great with an in-depth karcher cleaning that could freshen up and sanitize the place.

Regarding food service, their breakfast buffet was A+mazing. One of the best I’ve had in South Korea and so was the quiet ambiance at the dinning hall once you get it, only that we had to wait for 20min to get a table. Dinner on the other hand was quite mediocre and we only had Caesar salad which isn’t much of an elaborated dish. I’d recommend trying out at the Korean restaurant which might be better.

On a bright note, the hotel warns of the possibility of you encountering green bugs in the premise which we only had visit us during dinner, so we were quite vigilant once we arrived in the room. We did find several ladybugs running around the ceiling which I gently wrapped in a towel one by one to place outside in the terrace. I wouldn’t really mind or obsess over this since you’re literally in the mountains (many reviews tend to focus on this without considering the placement of the hotel) but there is no plague or anything to worry about in the...