The Zen Hotel — Hotel in Palo Alto

We chose this hotel/motel after reading all the reviews. The photos on their website also help a great deal. Except for doors that lead out to the parking lot, you'd never know you were in a renovated motel. This place had more features and amenities than many full-priced "high end" chains. For example, we stayed at the Hyatt in New York, and they had cramped rooms and no coffee maker in the rooms! I know that sounds nit-picky, but I need my coffee in the morning and I don't want to get all dolled up to visit some hotel's overpriced breakfast buffet!

The Zen room was clean, spacious, comfortable, and had plenty of small touches like free bottled water, coffee maker IN THE ROOM (Thank God!), great shower, robes, slippers, etc. In other words, you can tell this place is doing everything it can to overcome the fact that it's a remodeled motel. In doing so, they've outdone the major chains in my opinion. I almost don't want anyone else to find out about this place! Free Wi-Fi is a HUGE plus since I essentially worked there out of my hotel room the whole week. No connectivity problems. Also, free breakfast (though not a spacious setting) was very much appreciated as we didn't have to wonder every morning, "Gee, where should we have breakfast?" The breakfast selection was more than adequate - they had something for everyone. Another nice touch was apples and cookies available in the lobby. Oh, and parking is free though a bit cramped.

Basically, they provide everything that large chain store hotels nickel and dime you for. Ricardo, Anna, Letti, Ryan and the whole staff were courteous and very helpful. If you want a clean spacious and comfortable room, a staff that gives a damn, and nice little touches without getting robbed, then this place is worth considering. If you're too snobby and must stay at the big chains, then nothing I write here will make a difference. The folks at The Zen Hotel obviously take pride in the classy operation they are running over there. If in the area again, I would stay there without hesitation.

Very small gripes: The walls are a bit thin but most folks there were respectful and nobody was throwing any outrageous parties. We sleep with a "white noise" machine that drowns out any occasional sounds from the neighboring rooms. Also, I am allergic to Splenda and would encourage the folks at Zen to get some aspartame or Sweet & Low in additon to Splenda. Finally, the location isn't "beautiful" per se, but otherwise, it was centrally located to many dining and shopping options. Having a car is a plus. Really...

I book corporate travel... a lot of it... so I have seen the absolute best and worst of customer service. This definitely is in the rankings for the WORST service I have ever seen. In fact this is the absolute first time I have felt compelled to write a review... It started with trying to get a credit card authorization form. I had to make several calls. On like the third call I finally got someone to send it for real, but I insisted on staying on the line because I had to get this done. Thist took like 10 minutes (because they had an error in my email even though I spelled it phonetically. Whatever... happens. Then I discovered they require a copy of the drivers license, front back or the card and the form... not standard practice anymore... but again whatever. Most current hotels use Certify for business travel. I try to fax it t the number on their credit card auth form... several times... line is busy. So now I probably already have 1/2 an hour ot 45 inutes in filing this out. Call the hotel. The guy states the fax line was turned off. WHAT? He then asks me to email it instead. I say I can't... not secure. We try to fax again, and I insist on being on the line, because at this point I am less than impressed. Still not going through after several minutes. He then says the line has an issue. I state (in my normal tone of voice) So you are telling me the fax line is broken? Jorge, on the other end of the phone goes COMPLETELY UNHINGED. Starts yelling that he is an employee, like me. He never said the line was broken not to put words in his mouth. That he might be willing to help me, but I need to calm down (again, he is the only one yelling.) He is refusing to listen to me or problem solve. I ask for the manager. He is the manager. SCARY. Unreal. At this point I would never let a traveler stay at this hotel.... The conversation continues to become more unreal until he shouts "Bye Karen!!!" and hangs up. Needless to say, I just booked the Hilton Garden Inn up the street and cancelled...

First off, I was worried it would not live up to its praise, because it is a remodeled Motel. But, I decided to give it a shot and I was happily surprised. Lettie, who checked us in, was nice enough to offer us breakfast, even though we made it in at around 11am. That was awesome, since we had just made it through a 45 minute cab ride after our flight and were starving.

Because we arrived early, we chose to stay in the room right next to the washing room and vending machine. This was a bit of a mistake, but it was 100% our fault for choosing this room since our original room hadn't been clean yet. You could hear voices and Mexican music starting early in the morning. I wish I had a white noise machine or something to keep the noise lower, but we began to appreciate it as an alarm clock. When the weather is this beautiful and you are staying in such a great place like Palo Alto, you shouldn't be sleeping 'til noon anyway.

The free breakfast is incredible. Moist muffins, Peet's coffee, phenomenal eggs+bacon+sausage, and they even prepare fresh juice smoothies for you. There's fresh fruit, cereal, bagels, greek yogurt, and more. It changes slightly each day, which is nice. This has been one of the best free breakfasts from a hotel/motel we've had in a while. Normally, we just try a local restaurant for breakfast, but this was too good to pass on.

The location is convenient enough, being there is a bus stop right in front of the building. There is also a Walgreen's right next door. I wish it were closer to Stanford, but it really is just a 10-15 minute...