Le Hameau de Passy - Paris, France     

I stayed at this hotel for 2 nights as I was out in the city photographing a wedding with a Californian photographer. The hotel was recommended by the bride and groom to her guests. It is only a 10 minute walk from the Metro though with luggage it can be quite a hard 10 minute walk! The reception area is very neat and tidy though again you have to go up a step and down a step through reception with your luggage, while there is actually a gate right through to the rooms but it's locked! Getting to the room is interesting, a very narrow, steep and noisy spiral staircase, with no lift in my block though in other blocks I noticed lifts. Room was compact and bijou, as expected in France. Clean and comfortable though the metal staircase and the thin walls werent great!! Breakfast is included but is very basic; croissants, coffee. I wanted an omelette but you had to pay extra. Nice area, I enjoyed a walk about the shops the night before the wedding and had a lovely crepe! Overall not bad!

My mom and I just returned from a 7 night stay at Hameau de Passy. My mom is on a tight budget and wanted to find an inexpensive hotel. Unless I wanted to pay the bulk of a more expensive place, I had to find something in her price range, so I came to Tripadvisor and began my research. Boy, am I glad I tried this place. The location makes up for the size and lack of amenities. It is located just across the street from Plaza de Passy, which is a small shopping center with a grocery store, Starbuck's, H&M clothing, Gap, ect. Just down the street is MAC, BCBG, and Sephora to name a few. This listing of stores is just to give a reader the feel of the area...Upscale, cute and safe. If you walk through the Plaza, you come out on a cobblestone pedestrian street with excellent bakeries, cheese shops, creperies, etc. The grocery store in the plaza was also great to pick up local wines, prepared food, bottled water, etc. Now on to the hotel itself. Getting up to the room was a chore. We had 4 very heavy suitcases and had to get them up one floor on a spiral staircase. Once up, we found a small closet and no drawers, except for in the desk. I ended up living out of my suitcase, rather than unpacking. Walls were also extremely thin. So thin you could literally hear conversations that were being conducted in a normal tone. We were lucky that this only happened during the daytime, when we were awake anyways. The room was very small, as you can see from my photos, but very clean. So clean, in fact, that the cleaner smell was difficult for me to stomach. My remedy was to walk across the street to The Body Shop for Vanilla room spray. Once that was done I was happy (suggestion 1: bring room spray/candles). My next issue was the pillows. There were two for each of us. One neck roll and one square that was thin and lumpy. I'm a real pillow person so I searched to purchase one with no luck in our area, so I made do (suggestion 2: bring pillows). There were really no amenities in the room, ie: iron/board, robe, wine opener, refrigerator, shampoo, lotion, shower caps. The staff was very accommodating though. They chilled a bottle of champagne for us one day and opened our wine for us when needed. Our last evening the clerk even insisted on getting me glass wine glasses, when he learned I had been drinking out of plastic disposables (found in the grocery store). I also was able to borrow an electric adaptor a few times (they only had one to spare) since I had forgotten to bring one. Not sure if they have an iron available or not. Daily continental breakfast was included in our price ($1136 euros for 7 nights). They served baked items, coffee and orange juice. Eggs and some other items were available for an additional cost. There are two Metro stops within a 5-10 minute walk (depending on pace). Suggestion 3 is to get a Metro pass. Once you figure out the system it is wonderful and easy. You can get anywhere you want to go. We took the train out to Disneyland which also saved us money, rather than doing a tour. It drops you off at the gate. Versailles is another place where you can take the train if you want to save and not do a tour. On our way to the hotel, via Paris Shuttle (booked online before trip, recommended), our driver told us his favorite place to see the city at night was at the Concorde Lafayette Hotel. They have a skybar that was very cool. You have to buy drinks to go in, but it was fun. To me though, you can't beat the view from the Eiffel Tower at night. All in all, I would highly recommend the hotel because of the value and location. If you can't live without the little extras, stay elsewhere, but I am fairly high maintenance and I loved this place.