A short visit to Richmond - Doubletree Downtown

This was a weekend gateway for me as Richmond is only 2 hours away, and I never been. Parking over the weekend near the hotel was very easy to find, and there is no need to pay the overpriced valet parking fee. At every time of the day I found parking on the street, no more than 2-3 minutes away from the hotel.

Checking in was not a pleasant experience. It seems that I have interrupted the check-in clerk in some sort of an important activity and all he wanted is to get rid of me. I have checked in online the night before, but my room was changed upon check-in. Why I do not know. I asked about the Gold breakfast, but the response was only Diamonds get breakfast. I send him to check with his colleague, which he did by shouting to the other side of the counter. Of course, Gold members get breakfast, no apology given, just a shrug of incompetence. I did not even get a cookie.

I did get somewhat of an upgrade. However, the rooms are old, tired. The furniture is dirty (see the picture), and the room is full with wires running all over the place. The bathroom is in dire need for renovation, although the water pressure was good, and there was always hot water. The layout of the room and bathroom was just strange, with a lot of unused space within the room and a very tight bathroom that left very little room for movement.

Breakfast was decent, and as a Gold member I received the buffet breakfast which had cold and hot items and was really adequate. Service in the restaurant was usually good, but they did get flustered with many people coming in at the same time.

The internet was free as a Gold member, and usually fast. Although there were times it just went down without any reason for 10-15 minutes at a time. There is a flat screen TV in the room, but it is small and not HD. Not really up to the standards I would expect. Air conditioning was loud but was functional, although it took a lot of finking with it to get it to the temperature I liked.

All in all, it was an OK stay for what I paid (got the room on the Hilton weekend sell). If I paid the rack rate, I would be highly disappointed. I really don’t know why it bears the Doubletree name. It is more suitable to what I expect from a Hampton Inn. I guess the room cannot be standardized so the lowest they could give it is Doubletree. However, I have been in many much better Doubltrees, and this one was a disappointing as one.

Dirty Furniture

Small, none HD TV

Wires everywhere

Wires everywhere