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I don’t mind this hotel. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it to anyone, but I wouldn’t mind if I was stuck here for a week. I’d probably sum it up like this: if you book a room for yourself then you’ll be perfectly happy, but don’t bring anybody that you’re trying to impress. Just leave it for your solo trips.
I’ve only met one member of staff so far and that was the lady on reception who went through all the usual small talk like “did you have a nice journey?” (no, but I said yes), and “are you here for business or leisure?” to which I just blandly replied “business” – I suppose my job can technically be classed as business. I’ve got my smart trousers on and I had a shave a couple of days ago, so I can just about pass as a businessman.
Inside a room at the Radisson Blu
Photo: londondrum.comThings only began to go downhill when I entered the room because it’s rather small – and when I say small what I actually mean is tiny. It’s one of the smallest rooms I’ve ever slept in but it has a bed and a TV and a teapot in it – what else do you need? It has a minibar as well, but of course the prices are all double what you pay in the shops. If you don’t mind spending £3 quid on a can of Coke then you’ll be all right. And the little miniature bottles of whiskey are £6.75… so don’t plan on getting drunk.
Fortunately they’ve been quite generous with the tea because you get six teabags (but two of them are Chamomile, so they don’t count), four coffees, and enough sugar to make your teeth fall out. No biscuits though, and you can’t have a cup of tea without a biscuit so I’m marking them down for that. You can also ring down for room service and order yourself a posh-sounding ‘Philly cheese steak roll’ (translation: a cheeseburger).
What else do you get in the room… let me see… there’s no desk but you do get an iron, ironing board and a safe to keep all of your valuables in. I always think that it would be quite nice if the safe came with some valuables already in it, but of course it never does (maybe I’ll suggest that on their comment card).
Here’s a weird thing: instead of having some black and white photographs of London on the wall, or some squiggly pieces of modern art, they’ve decided to decorate the room with pictures of daggers and knives. It’s like a Rambo fan room. So that’s nice. That’s just want you want to look at before you go to bed… some combat knives.
Photo: londondrum.comEnsuite bathroom at the Radisson Blu
The bathroom is very small. It’s so small that you can probably have a shower, a shave and clean your teeth all at the same time. But it looks pleasant enough – and there’s a big pot of cotton wool balls on the side if you fancy having a snowball fight. It also has one of those terrifying make-up mirrors that magnifies your face about a trillion times. It’s a bit like peering into a microscope… you can see all of the microscopic bacteria and bugs crawling around on your skin.
Photo: londondrum.comBreakfast in the hotel restaurant
They’ve got a little restaurant downstairs which is quite posh for a 3-star, but only so-so for a four (half of the websites online rate this place as a 3-star, and the other half say it’s a four). Breakfast is just a buffet with beans, bacon, sausages, scrambled eggs, a bit of toast, bowl of fruit, tea, coffee… all of the usual stuff.
Hotel’s location near Marble Arch
The best thing about the hotel is definitely its location because you’ll find it in a quiet little side street between Selfridges and Marble Arch. You can walk to Piccadilly Circus, Leicester Square and Trafalgar Square easily enough, and Hyde Park is only five minutes down the road.
Parliament Square is just about walkable if you don’t mind the exercise, but it’s the kind of walk you’ll only try once – on the next day you’ll be thinking ‘nah, I can’t be bothered to do that again’ and jump on a bus. There are plenty of buses running down Oxford Street, and the tube will take you straight to St. Paul’s and Bank without changing trains.
