Hotel de Londres y de Inglaterra — Hotel in San Sebastián

There's really hit and misses for this hotel.

Given that this is one of the most prestigious and popular hotel along the beach. The service level cannot keep up with the hotel's history. Hence I give 2 stars for this hotel because I believe they will take the feedback seriously and improve.

While I could say the location was perfect, just right along the beaches that offers fantastic view and the proximity to the old town (just 5 minutes walk away), the service level needs to improve maybe 2 - 3 notches.

First incident, on arrival, I drove and I have requested for a carpark. The hotel did inform that there is parking but did not indicate clearly in their communications how much was it. Neither did they say how to go about getting into the carpark.

We spent a good 20 minutes trying circling around the vicinity to get to the front desk (as it was one way and the lobby was only accessible by one road). On arrival, that's when they gave a QR code to access the carpark (which is not in the hotel's compound). It took us more time to reach, which made us miss our dinner.

Only upon arrival, then we get the QR code, if not, we could never access the carpark. They could have sent the QR via email with clear instructions on where to park, which they did not.

Second incident, we were unfamiliar with the area and booked for a city view (which is basically a road view). When we requested to change to a sea view, they couldn't do anything much about it which we totally understood. However, I did ask them to come back to me if there are any cancellations. But for 2 nights, they didn't bother to reach out to me.

Third incident, one of the bed's springs was spoilt. Good thing is that they did recover from this immediately after I gave feedback. After housekeeping, the bed was in order. But to be honest, if this was a 5 star hotel, I don't even need to spend a night sleeping on a spoilt bed. They did not offer me an apology though.

Fourth incident, this was the worst! We bought some stuff from the old town and asked the shop to deliver the items to the hotel. The shop was fantastic and delivered on the same day. When I returned late in the evening to the front desk to ask for my items, the junior staff immediately said there were no items sent to us. Even when I asked for a re-confirmation, she was insisted.

At that point, I was a bit of a panic as the items were not cheap and there could be many possibilities, either the shop did not fulfil or the items were sent to the wrong hotel or given to the wrong guests.

Luckily, there was a more senior staff that asked me what items they were, when I gave brief description, the junior staff suddenly remember that she received the items from the shop before passing the items to me.

In summary, great hotel as a place but zero stars...

We arrived by car in Donostia-San Sebastián from Bilbao and located Hotel Londres right on the promenade without a great deal of difficulty, which was a surprise in itself as my wife was navigating. The doorman was extremely helpful, and when they had unloaded our luggage, took the car away for valet parking.

Hotel de Londres is an old hotel, with a history but it has been completely and tastefully renovated. It could not be in a better location overlooking the city's main beach in the bay of La Concha. The restored lift in the lobby was a constant source of fascination for me. I could have ridden it up and down for hours but my wife thought I was childish. The staff at the front desk, the bar staff, the concierge and the doorman were all accommodating and the facilities in the hotel excellent. Breakfast in the restaurant was very good with a plethora of choice

The hotel is located several hundred metres along the promenade from the old town. It has an excellent bar and lounge overlooking the beach, and in front of the hotel has an open air but undercover dining area and a place where you can enjoy a drink in the evening watching the quite extraordinary number of both locals and tourists, either on the beach or walking along the promenade.

There are so many options to eat in San Sebastian, which contains the highest concentration of Michelin Star restaurants anywhere in the world. There is also an equally high concentration of pintxos tapas bars. When, not if we return to Donostia-San Sebastián, we will once again stay in...

This hotel had a very old-fashioned and luxurious feel to it. We were greeted and treated very well from the start. I love the old fashioned wood elevator that took us up to our room.

Great customer service! A member of staff got all of our luggage out of the car and brought it up to our room. The bartender filled our water bottle with fresh water and opened our wine bottles for us. The concierge was able to tell us about some scenic drives to get us to the flysch rocks.

Parking is in an underground structure that is less than half a block from the hotel.

You can walk through the bar and exit through the back of the hotel to instantly access the beach. We did this for a cool morning swim. There is also a walking path and bike path between the beach and the hotel.

The hotel is located a short walk from old town and is therefore very close to lots of activities and tons of restaurants.

The greatest feature of the hotel and the reason that we booked it was for the fantastic ambiance and view provided by the balcony. We slept all night every night with the door open listing to the waves and we started an end of each day on the balcony looking out over the bay and watching people running, biking, walking their dogs, fishing, swimming.

We did not opt for the breakfast, and we did not use the restaurant or bar-these did seem very expensive, but the room was...