Excellent location, very thin walls! (Husa Moncloa Hotel (Madrid))

Member Name: Maggie1981

Product:	Husa Moncloa Hotel (Madrid)
Date:	29/03/09 (61 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Close to the centre, on the metro line, friendly bi-lingual staff, comfortable rooms

Disadvantages: Very thin walls!

My partner and I chose to take a short trip to Madrid for 5 nights and as we'd managed to get very cheap flights thought we would stay in a nicer hotel with a pool. Unfortunately as it was March we didn't think an outdoor pool would be appropriate and it seems that there are very few hotels in Madrid with indoor pools. We eventually stumbled across a website for the 4* Husa Moncloa and were excited by the images of fantastic looking rooms and a beautiful looking pool. We were however a little confused to see the same pool image on the website for the sister hotel, Husa Princesa. Nevertheless we went ahead and booked as we knew that the sister hotel was virtually next door and guessed that facilities must be shared between the two.

Arriving at Madrid airport we opted to take a taxi into the city, we could have taken the metro had we wanted to however we were both tired as we had both been up very early for the flight and were a little unsure about travelling on the metro as neither of us speak Spanish. We did some research on the plane and discovered that the taxi should cost in the region of 25 euro plus a small airport surcharge. Great we thought, we'd got cheap flights and managed to get a great deal on the hotel so we could splash out on what we assumed would be a quicker, more comfortable option and we wouldn't have to risk getting lost while we searched for out hotel. Afterwards we realised that the taxi driver had taken us a much longer route than he needed to, this is however probably something to do with our lack of Spanish and his non-existent English and after about half an hour in the taxi (of what we can only assume was him driving around and asking us over and over again where we wanted to be) did we think to give him the slip of paper with the hotel address. Looking back, now knowing how easy the Madrid metro system is to use, how close the hotel was to a metro station and how cheap it is to use it may have been a better idea to forget the taxi.

Check in time was stipulated to be midday however we arrived around 10am and didn't want to have to hang around for a few hours with our bags. We went to the reception to see if we could leave our bags there until we were allowed to check in and were pleasantly surprised to find we could check in early. After our taxi journey I wasn't looking forward to trying my (terrible) phrase book Spanish, luckily for us the staff on reception are all bi-lingual and spoke excellent English, much to my relief! Check in was fairly quick and easy and we were given 2 keys to a room on the 7th floor. On entering our room we were delighted to see we had a little entrance hall, a huge room with a big double bed, 2 comfortable chairs, tv, mini bar etc and off to the side another room containing a big desk and massive wardrobes. Off from this room was the bathroom, which again we were very pleased with as it had a bath! My only previous experiences of Spanish hotels has told me, as a rule, to expect not to have a bath.

On our first little adventure from the hotel, we discovered that the Arguelles metro station was around the corner so trusty guidebook in hand we bought a 10 trip pass (about 7.40 euros) and jumped on board to try and find the city centre. As it turns out we didn't have far to go and over the course of the trip we discovered that while the metro pass was handy to have, we didn't actually need it to get around. The Husa Moncloa is just off the main Calle de Princesa with numerous shops, restuarants and bars and a short walk to the Parque del Oeste, the Teleforica (cable car to the Casa de Campo), Plaze de Espana and Palacio Real. Slightly further, but certainly still within walking distance, is Puerta del Sol (the main tourist area). Most of our time was spent wandering around, only jumping on the metro when we were tired. Another good way to see the city was the Segway tour we booked ourself onto, not only do you have a lot of fun whizzing around on a Segway but you get to cover a lot of ground in a short space of time.

We spent the majority of our stay outside the hotel as we were lucky enough to have fantastic weather when we were there, however the time that we did spend there was comfortable and relaxing. Our only complaint would be that the walls between the rooms were extremely thin so when one of our neighbours received a wake up call at 6am one morning we did too!

We only used the hotel pool once and that turned out to be a bit of an escapade. Reading through the guide in the hotel room we discovered we were only to take the special pink towels down to the pool, we however only had one in our room. We also found we were supposed to wear swimming caps, something we did not own! No problem we thought, we'd be able to get another towel and caps at the pool. So we got in the elevator and went down to -1 which was where the pool should have been, only to find we were faced with a locked door and no way in. so back up we went to reception and were told we had to go through to the sister hotel and use the lift there, while there we also asked for another towel. Don't worry we were told, just use the ones from the hotel room (which you're told not to use!). Once at the pool we found that they do not have any swimming caps so once again we had to go back up the elevator and request them from the hotel reception. We eventually made our way back down, only to discover that the lockers do not have locks on them, you're expected to bring your own. As we didn't have anything valuable on us we took the risk of leaving things in unlocked lockers. The pool itself was a little cold and had 3 glass walls so that anyone working out could look in. We stayed for a little while however quickly tired of it and chose not to use it again. I think if it had been clearly explained to us how to find the pool, where we could get towels and swimming cpas etc from we would have found it much more enjoyable. However the rigmarole of going for a swim turned it into a much less relaxing experience. We were however prepared to go down again and felt it would be much more fun second time round but there was so much to see and do in the city that we chose to sacrifice the luxury of swimming.

All in all we had a fanstatic time in Madrid however we ignorantly thought there would be a lot of English speakers and it turns out we were wrong to think so. The majority of people we tried to communicate with were very good natured and gestured helpfully to try and help us, there were a number of more "local" places however that we did not find quite so friendly. In my opinion this is more to do with the frustration that they couldn't understand me and I couldn't understand them rather than general unfriendliness. The staff at the hotel itself were excellent, so much so that when we sat on the terrace and comically attempted to communicate with the waiter in Spanish he always repsonded in English!

We both thoroughly enjoyed our stay at the Husa Moncloa and would thorouhgly recommend it as a good base for sight seeing.

Summary: Very comfortable hotel, near the centre of Madrid, perfect for sightseeing