Crystal Gateway Marriott — Hotel in Washington

I stayed here for a few days in February for a company meeting. Definitely some good things, but also some things that need some improvement.||Check-in/check-out was very smooth, and the few times I had to interact with the hotel staff, there was nothing but smiles and a feeling like I was the most important person in the hotel at that time. Customer service was hands down, second-to-none. This includes my reporting a leak under the toilet at the shut-off valve. It was quickly and competently addressed, with no further issues.||I had a double room up on the 16th floor of the Arlington Tower. It was almost spotless, with only a broken zip-tie on the floor near the door, and there were a couple strands of stray long hair in the shower. Otherwise, I was pleased with the cleanliness of the room, and there were no strong smells/odors, good or bad.||Plenty of hot water was available. I never ran out in the shower. And it got there fast, with no pressure fluctuations either.||The HVAC had my favorite "always on" setting, which while not super loud, was sufficient to help drown out any stray noises. Of which, there weren't many. Yes, I could hear the volleyball kids from time to time in the hallway, but that wasn't very often. Yes, you could hear the occasional siren in the street below, but hey, it's Arlington. That happens. (And there was a double-shooting at the apartments across the street while I was there, too! No, I never felt it was a safety issue for us in the hotel.)||The pillows on the bed were a little more on the softer side, but certainly not as soft as I've had at hotels in other stays. And there were plenty of hangars for my clothes, something which can be an annoyance at times.||The conference areas were clean, organized, and well-kept.||The little "convenience" shop next to the front desk had a lot of items, but they were out of toothpaste (which I had forgotten). No problem! The front desk staff went to the back and gave me some toothpaste, gratis. Very nice touch. However, if you do get something to eat there, it's going to be pricey. A Drumstick was calling me one night, and that was $7.||The hotel is connected to the Crystal City Underground. Back in "the day" that meant a lot. Now... not so much. It means you can get to the Metro system easily, which also means easy transport to the airport. But CCU is only a very empty shell of what it used to be. It is a ghost town. From the hotel, you can find a Subway Sandwich Shop, a Sushi Shop, a Nail Salon, and a couple of other places. More on that later.||OK, now for the not so nice...||In the Arlington Tower, one of the 3 elevators was out of service the entire time I was there. Two elevators during a busy time doesn't provide a decent level of service. This led to some occasional longer waits for a car.||Several of the buildings escalators were out of service as well. I can walk, no problem there, but there were others that were forced to wait for elevators because they couldn't or wouldn't use the steps or the broken escalators.||Things seemed kind of "dark" in the common areas. Like they needed to install brighter lights, or turn up the ones that are there.||The restaurant in the lobby (15 & Eads, I believe it's called) is convenient, but be prepared to spend some money. A salad ran me $16, and a flatbread pizza (think something a little bit bigger than a Stouffer's French Bread Pizza, but with a flat crust) ran $15. And, I had an Old Fashioned that was probably the most expensive mixed drink I'd ever had. I remember joking with the person I was sitting with that for about $5 more, I could have bought an entire bottle of Old Grand-dad! :-)||The internet is only free if you are a Bonvoy member. Look, this is 25 years into the 21st Century. A hotel like this not offering free internet for every guest? Maybe I'm missing something, but that seems a bit on the chintzy side.||OK, let's talk CCU, and this is NOT a knock on the hotel; this does not at all factor into my rating.||Back in the day, there were lots of shops, eateries, a theater... lots of places to go. It's all gone with the exception of what I listed above.||Any map you find will likely show the hotel's section of the CCU connecting to the section near the eateries around 21st Street. This is wrong. The section of the CCU that runs under 20th St is closed off. You'll have to go outside for a little bit to pick up the underground again. See the map I uploaded to this review; the purple highlighted area is closed off. The red arrow, upper right, points to this hotel.||Overall, the stay was pleasant enough. You're in the middle of "the action" in Crystal City, and you're very close to the airport. I honestly had few complaints overall, but I feel like, for the money, the value wasn't totally there. Elevators & escalators out of service. Pricey meal options. Free internet only if you are a Bonvoy member. It was an OK stay. Not the worst, but...

Recently took a trip with my daughter to attend a convention held at this hotel. We were looking forward to a great time and a girls getaway however, this four star hotel made a terrible time out of our visit. We arrived later in the evening after a three hour car ride. We parked in the parking garage, which was tight, but understandable with the limited amount of space in the area. Parking in the garage was an additional $50 a night on top of the costly room price. After check-in, we walked down to the lobby and grabbed food at 15 and Eads. The food was terrible. The barbecue chicken flatbread had dried overcooked old chicken on a ridiculously over sauced flatbread. The pasta was tasteless and the service was ridiculously slow. After paying our bill we returned to the room to get ready for sleep, what we found turned our stomachs. One of the double beds had stains on the sheets, the wall was covered in old drippings of a mystery substance, the lampshade had ketchup (I hope) splattered all over it. The large bay window had no layer of curtains other than sheers to block out the city lights. Under the desk was a huge hole that had a lopsided plastic cover that I placed back over it for fear that something may crawl out of it. I called down at 10:50 PM and let the front desk know that the sheets in the room were dirty. They informed me that they would send housekeeping right away. I waited until 1130 and called the front desk again as no one had arrived. I was then informed that someone would be up. A kind employee came to the door at 11:40 with a single sheet that I was expected to change myself!!! I said, aren’t you going to change the sheets? And he informed me that he was not housekeeping that they had gone home at 11 PM. I then proceeded to show him the stains on the sheets the wall, the lampshade. He then called the manager and we were taken to a different room around 12:15 in the morning. Fortunately, that room was clean for the most part, But the TV did not work, and there was a desperate need to vacuum behind the TV stand and the desk -which had bottle caps and many many months of dust behind them. We stayed the following day for the convention and left the next morning around 2:30 AM. Checking out was easy, although no one cared to hear our concerns regarding the cleanliness of the hotel and the issues. We left the front desk and walked to the north elevators, hoping to ride them down to the parking garage, but they were not working. We tried for several minutes and then had to walk back to the front desk, and we were told that they would let engineering know. Thankfully, when I asked to be walked down to the parking garage from the outside entrance ramp, Lorenzo, who was at the front desk, was willing to watch us to our car for our safety. This was not a 4 star hotel experience. There was no compensation for the disgusting accommodations they placed us in with the first room. We will not go back there again. I have attached photos of the sheets on the wall just so you can get a general idea of what to avoid at...

I usually expect a Marriott to be a higher end hotel.

This, unfortunately, was not the case.

While it maintains the facade of a 4-star hotel, it's really just a Motel 6 playing pretend.

The first thing we (my group for IAC) encountered was some VERY confusing signage. We wasted about 10 minutes circling the block looking for parking, only to call and be told it's under the hotel. How do you know where? An unilluminated sign no bigger than a standard piece of letter paper. Oh, and did I mention the parking was $50 a night ON TOP of your room and food (which I'll get to later). Anyway, we attempted to park temporarily in front of the hotel to check in, because we could not Access the garage without a room key. We were met by a VERY aggressive valet, when, despite our clear "No, thank you" continued to try and sell us on his service. Upon realizing he wasn't getting any money, he crudely warned us "you [can] park for ten minute[s]. Just check in and come out in ten minutes." We attempted to check in but were delayed because the school's cars bounced (not the fault of the hotel, the front desk clerk was polite and helpful). We ended up waiting about 30 minutes trying to figure it out, but a minute or two after the "ten minutes" was up, the valet left his position to come track us down and rudely "remind" us about the car, apparently not realizing that you can't enter the garage without a room key. One member of our party had to go out and drive around looking for a spot on the street until we checked in. It was about 10:30 at this point, and so we walked across the lobby to get something to eat at 15th and Eads. Ha. We were seated by a crude and uncourteous waitress and then ignored. We saw this same waitress on her phone over the ledge, clearly not bringing us a menu, or water, or anything, in the hopes that we would go away. The restaurant closed at 11. We weren't exactly early here, but I think 30 minutes is enough to serve 2 people at a mostly empty restaurant. Conceding defeat, I moved to the Grab'n'go shop, where they value their commodities VERY MUCH. A standard gas-station type sandwich was ten dollars, a small bottle of water was 3 (more for stuff like Smart Water). I purchased a sandwich and grabbed some condiments and sat down to eat. Unfortunately some of their mayo packets were... less than satisfactory (there are children reading this review so I won't say what it looked like, but I'm sure you can imagine). And when we went back to the restaurant for breakfast, the CHEAPEST item was $15- for a few pancakes. It's a ripoff, bring your own food.

Thankfully the rest of our stay had no more major hiccups related to the hotel, busy as they say, first impressions are everything and this first impression sucked.

Also, $15 a NIGHT for internet? Hell, even MOTEL 6...