Grand Hyatt Vail Resort and Spa — Hotel in Vail

If I had the choice to give this hotel a 0 star, I would. My family and I are currently staying at this hotel for our Thanksgiving ski trip. Booked it through Amex Travel FHR. This is definitely not a fine hotel as described on American Express Travel. It's even worse than a one-star hotel... We thought we were fortunately given a nice upgrade to a spacious suite when we checked in as it's part of the perks stated on Amex Travel. However, it turned out to be our worst nightmare! Yesterday, the heater thermostat stopped working all of a sudden. The room became freezing. I called the front desk to notify them about the issue. The engineers came and quickly made the heater on again. The engineers mentioned that this is a 30-year-old hotel, so the equipment is dated. Over the phone, the front desk staff Billy impatiently said that it's normal to have things broken/not working. Well, I guess it's pretty standard to have a broken heater at this hotel. Later, I felt slightly dizzy and decided to lay down on the bed. My head was so heavy that I couldn't even move my body. After lying on the bed for almost an hour or so, my husband and son came back from outside, and they were appalled by the metallic and smokey odor inside our room. They immediately got me up from the bed and asked me what was happening. The smell was so unbearable. We had to open all the windows, but the odor was getting stronger and stronger. We quickly called the front desk again. Instead of sending an engineer to fix the issue, they sent someone to spray the room with an air freshener. The odor was so strong that the guy quickly left after spraying. Obviously, using an air freshener did not work at all. And sadly, I had a terrible headache and dizziness for the whole evening and even the following day due to inhaling the chemical odor. Next, I went to the front desk with my son to get help. Instead of solving the issue, the front desk Billy coldly replied that we should be satisfied since we were given a suite upgrade. What does that mean? Does it mean that we should be grateful for getting a suite in terrible, unlivable condition, and we should just shut our mouths no matter how bad the room is? This is absurd! Most likely, the smell was coming from the furnace, which is dangerous and harmful. The hotel treated this matter in such an irresponsible way! We then got to move to a smaller junior suite at the end. By the time we finished packing and unpacking our stuff, it was almost midnight. Then another unbelievable issue came up -- there was no cold water from the hand sink and shower, only HOT water available! We couldn't brush our teeth or take a shower because it was too HOT! My hands were burned and injured due to the hot water. Then we had to call the front desk again. The technician came but couldn't fix it. He told my husband that it's a known issue; other rooms on the same floor had similar problems, too. They never corrected them. My husband had to go to the front desk again to ask if we could get a room just to take a shower since it was too late and tiring to move to another room again. The first room she found had the same water issue. She then located another room for us, which is far from where we stayed. We had to go to another place to take a shower at 3 in the morning!!! They shouldn't have moved us to a room that had such a terrible issue in the first place... We're so disappointed with the quality and service that Grand Hyatt Vail and Amex Travel provided. After all the troubles and drama we experienced, the hotel is reluctant to compensate us. All they could do is refund the daily parking and resorts fees, which is utterly unacceptable! We had contacted Amex Travel several times, both the hotel and Amex kept passing the ball and avoiding the responsibility. This is undoubtedly a hotel you should...

Amazing place

Updated review: We loved this place!

Room 368 from August 11-15.

I came here on a business trip that we decided to mix with pressure and I brought my wife.

We loved it so much we started planning another stay with our kids.

Everything the entire stay was perfect…. Until the last night. It just seemed like maybe the staff didn’t have the same level of supervision than they had prior.

Sequence of events: We had a great day of activities.. fishing, hot springs, shopping etc. we didn’t have much to eat. We looked online on the website and it said food was available until 11pm at the bar. We ate at the bar two nights prior and it was great food, also the Japanese restaurant we ate at on site was awesome. So we decided we would eat onsite again.

We get back to the hotel around 9:30. Arms full of shopping. Get up to the room, surprised that both keys don’t work.

I call and text the front desk cause we have a bunch of stuff and let them know and they said I have to come to the front desk. I said can’t you bring it up? And she said she’s at the front desk alone. Fine…I go down, but I am surprised I’m not getting service level excellence by bringing the keys up. On my journey down I see staff at the front desk.

We get down to the bar at 9:50-10. We speak to the male server he offers us the menu. Then a lady gets our drinks. We spend 15 minutes trying to figure out what we want and when we decide she tells us kitchen is closed. I informed her that the website said 11pm she said no the kitchen closed 9:45. So now we have wasted our time, valeted the car, bought a drink and sitting there hungry with no food at our finger tips.

To be honest hangry at this point.

I go to the front desk and there’s two ladies there. I ask is there any food delivery available or food options, they let me know of two pizza places. We start searching on our phones and struggling to find these places they said, and They aren't offering any assistance even though we are 2’ from them and vocal about our struggles. We stay at a lot of high end resorts, especially domestic facilities and normally when someone suggests something they immediately offer details cause they are trying to help the client with their experience. They see us struggling and finally I ask, where is this place? So she tells me Minturn.

We did the timing math and we really didn’t want to eat pizza by the time it came at 11:30 to midnight so we decide to go hungry.

I decided I’m going to now also inform them that we expected the bar food to be available cause the website does say it was available after a long day out. I wasn’t expecting much, just to inform them so the web changed or maybe they made an extra effort to help. The one lady argued with me in a “ tone” that the info flyer said a different time. I said, the website is different. And she just said “anyways it’s not open” and goes back to what she’s doing. Her tone was a 1 star.

I’m noticing they couldn’t care less about our challenge of needing to find some food and Surprised they are not offering us anything from their market we just walked away annoyed and went to bed.

These are fairly minor issues in the grand scheme of the world. But I think management needs to know this place went from a 5 to a 3 star experience for us. Also the website needs updating. Also the staff need better training or supervision. Hard to have a 5 star hotel when you have players on the team with an unhelpful attitude. All players should intend to make and keep all clients raving fans.

I included a picture with time stamp of the hours of the restaurant.

Some positives: house keeping staff 5 star coffee shop staff 5 star valet staff 5 star view 5 star food taste 5 star rooms 4 star Drinks 5...

[Updated 3/2024, see below:] Original 2022/23 Review: I’ve stayed here 3 times now this winter season and every time the experience gets better! Madeline, the Guest Experience Manager, has always reached out by email prior to my stays and has been so helpful in getting any accommodations made prior to my arrival. It has made check in seamless every single time. Great communication!

The valet and bellhops have always provided great service. The waitstaff at the Gessner restaurant are always outstanding. In particular, I have to shoutout Juan. He went above and beyond to make our last breakfast experience excellent. The breakfast buffet has a great selection.

This is a true ski-in/ski-out resort. The ski valet service at Venture sports has completely spoiled us. There’s never a line at the Cascade Village lift. Best secret to getting up the mountain as fast as possible.

The Grand Hyatt shuttle is very convenient, runs every 15 minutes between Cascade Village, Lionshead, and Vail Village.

Great gym with multiple peloton bikes and a couple Tonal machines. Small ice rink. Happy hour yurt. Axe throwing. Couple jacuzzis (my only wish is more hot tubs). Video game/board game lounge for the kiddos. Good Apres atmosphere in the lounge.

The beds are some of the best hotel beds we’ve ever slept on. The extra topper they have on the beds makes a massive difference.

This has become our favorite place to stay in the mountains!

[UPDATE: 10/10/23] Stayed for peak fall foliage season. Beautiful yellow aspen groves all over Vail. The hotel location right next to Gore Creek is perfect. Mountain/creek view with fall foliage is amazing.

Service as always was really good. Great to see familiar faces from last season. Tracy at the Gessner has waited on us multiple times last season and now this time. Always the brightest smile!

Only critiques are: Bring back the breakfast buffet!! Please! The a la carte menu was not as good as the breakfast buffet from last season. We know buffet spreads are not for everyone. But the buffet selection last season with some items on a made to order menu was the perfect fit, IMHO. Very disappointed to hear that this may be a permanent decision. I always enjoyed the idea of a quick in and out gourmet breakfast so that we could get out on the slopes ASAP.

The kids play area in the Gore Creek Market area needs help. Looks like it's been ransacked and not very well kept compared to last season. I understand that maintaining a public area where kids abuse electronics is a difficult proposition. But none of the game consoles were properly working. The lights were flickering. Hopefully before ski season it gets cleaned up and revamped.

Knocking off a star because of these issues.

[UPDATE: 3/17/2024] Adding 5th star back. Stayed an additional 3 times during ski season and they addressed all concerns. Staff are always wonderful. they brought back the Gessner buffet, cleaned up the kids area, and added an amazing restaurant...