An ideal location and a good night's sleep (Travelodge London Covent Garden)

Member Name: nixtee

Product:	Travelodge London Covent Garden
Date:	06/11/08 (169 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Quiet, good location, not too expensive, friendly staff

Disadvantages: Marked cuttlery & glasses

Having won a couple of train tickets to London in a local newspaper competition, I then needed to book somewhere to stay. I wanted to be as close to the city centre as possible, but without the huge costs.

I've stayed at a number of Travelodge hotels in the past, including a couple in London, so I checked out the Travelodge website. A number of Travelodge hotels were available in London city centre, but I decided to choose Covent Garden Travelodge due to it's location.

To stop at Covent Garden Travelodge on a Thursday night during October half-term cost me £99. I also paid an extra £10 for early check-in (from midday instead of from 3pm) and then another £10 for 24 hour WiFi internet access. So that'a £119 in total. More than I'd normally pay, but I got the location and facilties I needed.

The hotel is a couple of streets away from Covent Garden underground station, but isn't far from Holborn underground station either.

We accessed the hotel via a large number of steps, but there must be a more accessible entrance to the hotel as there was a mini lift for wheelchairs from the reception area down the few steps to the bar area.

The reception staff were friendly and we were checked-in swiftly. I didn't need my debit/credit card as I'd already paid online. We were only given one room card between 2 of us (sharing a twin room), but that didn't matter too much. However, the man served before me was offered 2 room cards, so it's a bit hit & miss.

Our room was on the 2nd floor of the hotel and was easily found. I believe the hotel is split into two parts, but our room was in the main part.

The room was decorated in Travelodge's blue & white style. We had 2 single beds with a bedside cabinet between them. Also in the room was a set of drawers with an LCD TV on top, a desk and chair, a place to put our bags, a wardrobe, a heater and a shelve holding a kettle and tea/coffee.

The bathroom was clean (although there was water marks below the taps) and had the usual bath/shower, toilet and skink. Oh and a very small bar of Travelodge soap!

The lighting in the room could have been better. There was no main light, just 2 bedside lamps and 2 inset lights (of which only 1 was working).

After a longer afternoon in the city, we decided to have our evening meal at the hotel. We ordered fish & chips and steak & ale pie, onlt the steak & ale pie was "finished" so a cheese burger & chips was ordered instead. While waiting for our food, I was about to pour my J20 into the glass provided when I saw the state of the glass and changed my mind, I drank straight from the bottle instead! They were probably only water marks, but there was enough to put me off.

My first thoughts when the meal arrived were that the plate for my fish & chips was a bit on the small side (it looked more like a kids place, but oval). My second thought was that the cuttlery was water marked too, so I gave them the once over with my paper serviette before using them. The food was OK, nothing special but then it's only Travelodge. The bar had a large screen TV showing BBC News 24, but unfortunately it was the Ross-Russ Radio 2 scandal over and over and over.

Despite being a city centre hotel, there wasn't a great deal of noise during the night (which surpised me). It was only around 6.30 - 7am that was awaken by noise (the dustbin men!). It's always a plus for me to get a good night's sleep!

Anyway, overall the hotel was fine. It's certainly an ideal base for exploring the centre of London. Not somewhere you'd be looking to spend a geat deal of time, but a good place to sleep.

Summary: A good base if exploring London