Hotel Gates - Berlin, Germany     

Hotel Gates is located in a great section of Berlin. Subway is close by - around the corner and down the street and so is a number of cafes, pasteries, a print/photo shop, book store, a t-shirt/jean store etc etc. If it was a nice day, you could walk to the Zoo Palast, or take the subway one stop. Hotel is very clean, adequate, geared for business person or someone attending a film festival, convention centre or for anyone who needs to stay in touch with the world via internet, or needs to get any information. Buffet was amazing. Great quality of food, big selection, and they changed a few items every day. Dining room, was huge, immaculately clean, and the wait staff were friendly and all spoke English which I was grateful for. Same with front desk staff. Very professional, friendly, English was perfect, and staff were very helpful. Some of them however, mainly the night staff would look at you suspiciously if they never saw you previously. After an exchange of pleasanteries and with your door key in hand, they were fine after that - just be patient with that. Housekeeping was very friendly. If you needed to sleep in t'll noon, you would be left alone . You should always put the do not disturb sign up even though when I was in Bologna, Italy, the staff there didn't seem to respect that sign. Overall nice stay, very clean hotel, spacious, simple decor, nice balcony view, large bathroom, white clean tiles, a girls best friend - a removable shower head with great water pressure and adequate amounts of hot water. Large bathroom mirrors and room for accesories. Ask for towels only if you absolutely need fresh towels.

I booked rooms for myself and two business colleagues as we were attending a trade fair in berlin. It was difficult to find rooms as the fair co-incided with the Berlin Film Festival, but I managed just before New Year to reserve 3 "Business' rooms at ? 185 each per night. For the price paid, the rooms were very small, shabby and not in great repair - certainly not 4 star quality. When we complained, we were told that this was a normal grade room for the price we paid and that was all they could do. We said that as they were not up to standard we were leaving to find somewhere else (3 nights here would have been horrible). The manager said that there was little he could do and that we would be charged in full as they wouldn't be able to sell the rooms at such short notice - there were probably lots of people roaming around the city desperate for somewhere to stay. He didn't handle the complaint very well and we just left and found somewhere else which was much better. Inflated prices due to trade fair/film festival perhaps, but the room quality remains the same all year round. If you can, avoid at all costs.