Holiday Inn Express — Hotel in Monterey

Its somewhere between a 3.5 and 4 rating, but edged toward 4. There were positives and a few negatives. I stayed for 4 nights as a getaway trip (midweek) to escape the hot temps inland and to visit the coastal area and check out Monterey in general .|Pros: --the room I had was on 3rd floor , corner. It was recently renovated and therefore everything new and clean. |-- the room was a KING size bed and had lots of floor space. So "roomy" . The bathroom sink area had a reasonable size counter to your "stuff" on, and store things under the counter on floor. Nice towels. Everything new.|-- TV -- I think it was Direct TV ..so had lots of channels for news and movies but I didn't use it.|-- the location is great for "cannery row" and Aquarium. All easy/short walking distance. Even the Fisherman's Wharf area is about a 1 mile walk away along the bike path. Easy walk and pleasant. All good exercise , along the bayside and very pretty. Passed by San Carlos Beach with hundreds of Sea Lions hanging out. Very unusual to have so many there. But it was Stinky and very noisy ( sea lions bark loudly). Glad I wasn't staying right next to that area.!|-- lots of restaurants to walk to. Never really need to move your car if just staying in vicinity and walking.|-- majority of parking underground and I always could get a spot, at least for midweek.|-- Breakfast was above par. Lots of room to sit. Hot/cooked options ( omelets, scrambled eggs, sausages), make your own pancakes, as well as lots of pastries, bagels, oatmeal, cereals. There was always coffee ( they kept the containers full), and there was a little refrigerator with small "school lunch" type milk containers for Non-fat or 2% milk and some yogurts. You will get a full breakfast here. I usually did eggs and oatmeal and coffee/milk and it was all good.|-- front staff, kitchen workers for breakfast, and the housecleaning staff were all friendly and did their jobs well. Housecleaners work their butts off. Tip them at end!|-- the OUTDOOR space is really nicely landscaped with patio furniture and umbrellas. Pretty. Nice place to have a meal or just hang outside your room||CONS: -- stairs , and more stairs. Slow elevator. Even just walking on the same floor, you will come across stairs . I presume because this INN lives on a hill. So, dragging your luggage from elevator to my corner room, I had to go through 2 sets of "shortish" stairs ( 7-9 stairs??). That was awkward. This is true for 2nd and 3rd floor. So , if stairs an issue, get on 1st floor. There is only a few stairs to get 1st floor rooms. |Since the elevator was pretty slow, I usually always took stairs. Lots of exercise, which was good. I only used elevator for moving my things in/out of room.|-- construction ongoing for 2024 but I think finishing up soon. So, yes , there is some construction noise from 9am to 4pm. But they said it was finishing soon. It was downstairs, so far away, but of course noise travels up. |-- bed ... For me, the new mattress was too soft. I prefer FIRM. Its always a crap shoot when staying anywhere as to what kind of mattress firmness you will get. But I sank too much into it and didn't like it - nor did my back. That was a negative for me. I know many others may prefer the softer mattress. So you decide.|-- Noise -- my room had issues I never would have thought about. (1) seagulls liked to hang out on the building's rooftop right outside one of my windows. Seagulls are noisy things. Every morning at 530ish, they started squawking. So, I learned to keep windows closed. Maybe Holiday Inn mgmt can offer to put Bird Spikes on next door property roof/chimney area to discourage the birds from "roosting" there and disturbing their guests at Inn. (2) FOAM Street. The inn sits between Wave Street and Foam Street. The other window in this corner room looked out on Foam Street and the Victorian Inn. Foam Street is a BUSY street. So lots of traffic sounds starting early in morning with workers getting on the road. So again, needed to keep those windows closed too. If windows closed, and blinds closed ( light pollution), it was "ok" ...just couldn't get "fresh air" unfortunately.|BTW, the windows only open about 3 inches.|The Room has AC, which I used , since I had to keep windows closed, and with Sun hitting one side in afternoon it would get warm ...even in Monterey.||I would come back again, but only if I could get a WAVE street side room, and maybe 1st floor or 2nd floor.|The bed is an issue, so this wouldn't be my 1st choice.||BTW, booking directly with Holiday Inn , I did save some $$ and rates were very reasonable midweek for the location. This was a last minute trip so I was lucky to get anything.|Many Europeans were staying here ( families or couples). All very nice people and interesting to talk to at breakfast if they were up for a chat.||Again, the front staff were super nice ...all of them.||A pleasant place to stay and I would recommend ( if you don't mind the few negatives I...

I was given a room that was facing a very busy street. I could hear people talking loudly on the streets and cars passing by throughout the night. In the morning, I went down to breakfast, using the very haphazard sets of stairs, proving extra hazardous on a rainy day. Breakfast had very limited choices, especially for those who have dietary restrictions, including those with diabetes. The eggs were simply laid down in a tray, people picking with their hands, with no tongs, exposed. It didn’t seem sanitary at all. The rest of the food was sugary and full of carbohydrates. The fruit was bruised and old. The second night, the people in the room above us were running back-and-forth throughout the entire night. I had to wake up early the next day in order to drive back home. I tried to deal with this situation with patience, plugging up my ears with tissue even, but eventually called the front desk at 10 pm. Unfortunately, no one at the front desk answered. I called again and again with no answer. I complained about the party above us, running back-and-forth through the night and early into the morning, upon checkout. I wanted to talk to the hotel manager, but the agent let me know that he wouldn’t be there until 7:15 AM. When I came back at 7:30, I asked to speak to the front desk manager again, to which I was informed was out of town. Obviously, there’s a lack of communication amongst staff, and the staff did not know the manager was out of town, causing guests inconveniences. I let the agent know that the situation was only resolved after I’d called the fourth time past midnight when someone actually answered the phone. I informed the agent that I had a very long drive of 6-7 hours ahead of me, now having been sleep deprived for two days. I explained to him that at any other hotel, my concerns would’ve been immediately addressed. However, being that the phone was never answered until past midnight, the party above us continued being noisy. All this made for a bad trip when it was supposed to be a gift for...

We stayed at this hotel for a total of six days and five nights. On our final evening, I received a call from Kristin at the front desk informing me of a noise complaint from the guests below our room. I was surprised by this, as we were already in bed preparing to turn in for the night.||At 11:00 p.m., we were woken again by a second call regarding another noise complaint. At this point, we were quite frustrated, as we had been asleep and there was no activity or movement in our room. I decided to go to the front desk in person to better understand the situation.||During this interaction, Kristin was noticeably condescending and unwilling to consider the possibility that the noise may have originated elsewhere. I asked whether there could be a washer or dryer near the complaining guests’ room that might have caused the disturbance, but she promptly dismissed the suggestion and insisted that the issue was coming from our room.||Her demeanor was unprofessional and dismissive. She implied that I was making her uncomfortable, even though we felt increasingly uncomfortable with how the situation was being handled. When I asked why she chose to believe the other guests’ account over ours, she openly stated that she’s choosing to believe the guests—prompting me to ask, "Are we not guests as well?"||We travel frequently for both business and leisure and have stayed in numerous five-star hotels. We have never received a call regarding a noise complaint or any kind of issue of this nature. It was especially disappointing to encounter such inhospitable treatment from a front desk worker at a Holiday Inn—particularly on the final night of what had otherwise been a long stay.||I intend to contact corporate to file a formal complaint regarding this incident. While the hotel's location is excellent and the housekeeping staff was consistently friendly and professional, our experience with the front desk staff was deeply disappointing and ultimately marred the end...