The Royal Sonesta New Orleans — Hotel in New Orleans

Every year I go down to New Orleans with my partner in August and we spend a bit under a week in the city. This year we cut it down to 3 days/2 nights, so we wanted to get a place in the middle of it all to save time and get in everything we wanted to do, but that's where this property truly disappointed. The first night,we checked in and everything seemed fine, only disappointment was the fact that the pool closed at like 7pm, just before we checked in, so we didn't get to swim the night we checked in like we wanted to. The big issue came the second day, when after we got back to our room after swimming, we couldn't get into the room because the lock had died. So we're freezing in the 60° hallways in our wet swimsuits and we go down to the lobby to ask for help, which the receptionist tells us they'll send someone up... what they neglected to tell us was that it would take them well over a half an hour to get up to our room. The security was very friendly and let us in our room and told us maintenance would be up shortly to fix the door. Mind the part where I said our trip was short and we crammed in a lot of stuff, so our riverboat cruise was leaving soon, so we waited about 10 minutes for maintenance after rinsing off and changing, so probably a good 15-20 minutes total, before realizing they probably weren't coming and ran off to catch the boat. Fast forward 2.5 hrs later, the door still doesn't work. So we go downstairs and they offer to switch our room, which we agreed to since it was the same type of room. They sent us up with one of the employees who pushes that luggage cart around, which we didn't need because we only had 2 bags, but I'm glad he came up, because they made us wait another half hour for someone to come up again! It was so bad after about 20 minutes the employee we were with went into another room to call the front desk and make sure that someone was actually coming! Once security did come up again things went fairly smooth as we switched rooms, but the time was gone. We stayed 2 nights, and totaled up about 40ish hours total with access to the property and over an hour of it was spent waiting in the halls to access our room and our stuff. We could've gone to the business district and back with that kind of time... That really ruined it for me. And the room we were moved to was super gross. The mirror looked like it had burn marks, the curtain was broken, and it had one chair while the room we were in had 2 chairs, which is nice when you're 2 people in a small room with a king bed, having a spot for both people to sit. And the room must've had something in it because we were fine the first night, but after the second night we were both sick.

As for everything else on the property, its pretty good. The pool, although it closes too early, was nice, they've got a bar right next to the pool open from 11a to 7p. The room had a nice view of the side street with a small balcony that was just big enough to sit outside on. The Jazz Playhouse was really nice, they had good drinks and desserts and the artist playing on Tuesday nights was phenomenal. And the best part is just walking out the front door and being right on Bourbon street!

Another bonus is you get tour discount codes for staying with them, its like 10-25% off depending on the tour, but that's nice. And the sugar cookie at check in was cool too.

And if you're worried about noise, yes there's a lot of loud noise, but frankly I can't be upset about it because what do you expect being right on Bourbon street? It goes from about 4pm until 2-4am. If that's a problem, you shouldn't stay here.

I probably won't stay here again, just because I like to be able to get into my room myself and I don't want to risk getting sick from one of their poorly cleaned rooms. But if you want to stay in the middle of everything on Bourbon and you're willing to take that gamble on whether or not things work out for you, this place isn't half bad if you only get the good parts.

If it wasn't for the wasted time and the inconveniences, I would've...

Edited to add after the hotel replied below: That response, especially with such huge safety concerns, is abysmal and only furthers all of the points I make in the original review. This hotel will not change, don't stay here.

This hotel is unsafe, dirty, and overpriced. I truly have no idea how this is rated a 4 star hotel, it's objectively a two star. There is nothing premium about this hotel besides the gorgeous lobby (that smells like cigarettes and trash).

We are well traveled, and are doing a coast to coast trip across the country and have stayed at five 4+ star hotels this trip - this was by far the absolute worst experience out of all of them or any hotel we have ever stayed at.

First of all, the entirety of the hotel was accessible without keycard for our entire stay. The front door of the hotel opens to Bourbon street, which is incredibly busy, drunk, and gross. The parking garage is full of people "hanging out." All of the doors to come into the hotel were UNLOCKED and ACCESSIBLE all of the times we used them, so ANYONE could have just walked in at any time. And on top of that, the elevators were not keycard locked: anyone can go anywhere in the hotel without a keycard. This is unacceptable from a safety standpoint and could be incredibly dangerous for anyone (especially women or lone travelers). Especially when the balcony can't even be enjoyed because random men will cat call and shout at you, and you have to be worried about these random strangers having easy access to your room.

Secondarily, the rooms are cramped and disgusting. Our toilet leaked when flushed. The floors left dirt on my white leather bag. The water had a hard time draining in the tub.

And thirdly, the "heated" pool is not heated. Or rather, according to the front desk employee that argued with us, it's "not heated during the summer in NOLA"... It's October and 65 degrees. There were 30 people at the pool when we went, and no one in it because it was too cold. When we got to the pool we asked the pool employee if anything was wrong with it because no one was in it, and he said no. The front desk employee said we could have called down to request the pool heater be turned on... so that the pool can finally heat up a few days from now? Heated pools aren't immediate. We picked this place largely because it had a private heated pool, but it was neither private (non-guests could access because of the safety problems) or heated. I was also appalled that an employee at a four star hotel would so blatantly argue with a guest about something that the hotel is in the wrong about. It says directly on their website that their pool is heated, which she didn't know, and then argued about it being summer or that we could have called and ask it to be turned on.

We are seasoned travelers and can typically tell when a hotel is bad news. The "good" reviews are not accurate. I imagine our experience is typical. I'd recommend any other hotel in the area, especially if you are a woman, a family, or care about not wasting your money on a terrible experience. There are a ton of better hotel options, that are the same price or cheaper.

The only good thing about this hotel is Joe in valet. Professional, prompt, and fantastic service. This garbage place doesn't deserve such a lovely and hardworking...

Just recently spent one evening at The Royal Sonesta New Orleans. We were originally booked for three nights and had to cancel our stay to move to a different hotel altogether.

Upon arrival, I was excited to see that the lobby was nice enough and looked clean and grand. We were dying for a restroom while checking in and we were directed to the mens restroom, which was one toilet and a urinal. There were probably 200 people in the lobby. This is not an appropriate restroom facility for a hotel of this size. Further, the door on the mens stall would not shut so there was zero privacy. We asked if we could use restrooms by the fitness facility while we waited to check in and were denied. We had to walk three blocks to the Hyatt Hotel so we could use the restroom. This was the first red flag and we should have just moved then. The Hyatt was beautiful, clean and the staff was super friendly. A far cry from the Royal Sonesta.

As we approached our room after checking in, I noticed how dirty and worn down the entire building was. There were broken glass sconces in the hallways, stains everywhere, etc.

When we walked into our room, I noticed stains down the sides of the room chair. The towel hook was installed upside down, so we had nowhere to hang towels. We then found that our shower had no pressure at all and also would not drain properly. We were standing in a nasty puddle by the time we finished showering.

I laid my head on my pillow and noticed a faint smell of vomit, but thought maybe it was my shoes. I am fully aware of what Bourbon St smells like, so I thought "yeah I'm going to scoot these shoes away from the bed." Hold that thought.

We made several requests to have someone come up to unclog the shower. Each time we were told that someone would be right up. No one ever came. We requested that the shower be worked on the next day and we were again told that someone was coming right up. No one ever showed up.

On break from our conference, my husband went to request a new room, which they gave us. Meanwhile, I went up to the room and laid on the bed for second only to smell vomit again. I moved the mattress and see that there is dried liquid something (I can only guess vomit) down the back of the headboard. I was beyond done and disgusted. The staff allowed us to cancel our stay and charged us for one night without protest. That is the only reason that there are two stars for service. We went to the Hilton on St Charles St and received a King suite for $100 cheaper per night.

Also things to note: There are no filtered water stations anywhere in the building, so you are forced to purchase $8 bottles of water. There are no quick grab and go food options. There are no bathrooms outside of the room for use of guests of the hotel and the one they send you to has no privacy and is filthy.

I am not ignorant to the fact that Bourbon St in and of itself is filthy. I'm not sure what I expected of New Orleans, but I will never be back. It is totally not my taste. Overall just a really dirty city and the Royal Sonesta was definitely a factoring reason that I have this perspective, which is sad because it has so...