A real treat (Hotel Plaza Real)

Member Name: ermintrude

Product:	Hotel Plaza Real
Date:	07/06/01 (49 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Location, ambience, helpful staff

Disadvantages: Price

I can't take the credit for having booked into this hotel - the friends I travelled with made all the reservations (how sweet :). I always did trust their judgment, and now I trust it even more!

There are two main advantages to the Plaza Real, and probably the main one is location. It's barely a block from Santa Fe's plaza, a leafy, green place to sit and people-watch, surrounded by shops, and with the Palace of the Governors (now the city museum) and its Native American traders on one side. You can walk to pretty much everything in town, from the Capitol to the Georgia O'Keeffe museum - there's no need to drive in along the soulless mall-filled strip, you're already right there in the thick of things.

Speaking of driving, if you think a city location means parking hell, then you'll be relieved to hear there's an underground garage to be had for $10 a night. Just watch the in-ramp if you have a low-slung car...

The other good thing about the Plaza Real is the sheer quality of the hotel. Although owned by Radisson, there's none of your chain-hotels atmosphere here. Everything has a traditional style, from the wooden chandelier in the foyer, and the cow skull on the wall behind reception (really!), to the tiled floor in the lift and the Native American artifacts (or facsimiles thereof) on the walls of the rooms. It all exudes the essence of the Southwest.

We were lucky with our room. Having booked one with two double beds, we were told there were "housekeeping issues", and were quickly transferred to another room. So, for the same price ($139/night for the room is the list price, but ask about discounts), we had a suite (list price $249/night), complete with log fireplace, microwave and coffee maker (albeit with average coffee), one bedroom with oodles of space and the biggest bed I have ever seen, and a sitting room with a foldout bed. Both rooms had TVs, and there was a neat shower/toi
let room with handpainted tiles, plus a washbasin outside in the bedroom. Rugs on the wall, cosy lighting, warm earth-toned colours, and lots of wood... very welcoming.

The foldout bed was obviously not the comfiest thing ever, but I managed to get a reasonable night's sleep, disturbed only by the air conditioning plunging the room into what felt like sub-zero temperatures in the wee small hours. Top tip - get extra blankets from reception if you have a foldout :)

Many of the rooms look out onto the hotel's rear courtyard, a narrowish space with many balconies and porches, featuring the strings of dried chillies (whose name escapes me) that you see on many buildings around town. In the few hours a day it gets the sun, it would be a pleasant place to sit and read, or write postcards.

I did my postcard-writing on the verandah by the bar, people-watching in the sun. The street is busy enough to be interesting, but not so bad as to choke you with fumes. The bar does have local microbrews (I recommend the Santa Fe Pale Ale to revive dry throats), but they come at a price, as you would expect in a hotel bar. A beer and a G&T came to $8 or so.

Breakfast was one aspect of the hotel we didn't sample - at $9 for a "continental" selection, we decided we were better off heading into town for some traditional New Mexican fare. And we were right. Forego the rolls and fruit, and head to Cafe Pasqual's or the Guadalupe Cafe for a breakfast that will really set you up for the day (if not the rest of the week). I'll save those for other reviews :)

Simply for location and ambience, the Hotel Plaza Real is worth the extra cash if you have it. It'll make your stay in Santa Fe that bit more enjoyable.

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