London Views of the River Bank with Park Plaza Hotel

Hey everyone!

So I wanted to give you a full experience review of my recent stay with the Park Plaza Hotel London, this is the River Bank specific Hotel as there are three I think within about ten minutes walk around that part of London and I was invited to try out their absolutely fantastic suite and Pride menu which I mentioned in detail here.

So I’m not really sure how to begin this blog because I’m a bit confused as to what parts of it I’d like to focus in on, as my experience was really strange. Firstly it was an absolute pleasure to partner with Park Plaza who had invited me to stay as a comped experience in exchange for my review here and on my social media, so there’s the full disclosure. However the hotel itself was just a bit of a strange one. I walked through London from Victoria as I still am learning walking bearings in London, I always get cars so I’m useless at remembering where things are. But I found the Park Plaza and it was one of those gorgeous rainy days where everything was a bit drizzly.

I arrive at the Hotel and the foyer is set up in a disjointed way so that I was a bit unsure where to find the reception to check in, it was to the left of where I entered and I couldn’t determine whether to follow the illuminated stairs or venture in further. I was navigating through the PR agent and had not had direct contact with the hotel. But I explained I was there to the receptionist for the review and that I was extremely excited to find out about the layout of the hotel, maybe some history. The woman basically told me she had lost her voice and had no knowledge of my specific stay other than the booking reference so I was just a bit taken aback, but this can happen so I went with it. I was not given the check out instructions nor what my set up for the room was, which I later found out had a locked minibar and a range of the ammenities that weren’t explained, such as this compression coffee machine I’d never used before or the television which I attempted to use at length.

So I went up to my room, optimistic and a little bemused but confident that the room was going to blow my socks off, because I do have a love for rainy London days and my floor was super high so I thought I would get a great view. Wow! What can you possibly say about the view but stunning! I was met with a chocolate plate and some red wine, it was just such a lovely touch and the river was absolutely fanastic. I couldn’t wish for a better gesture and the layout of the room was really lovely. The suite was the only shaped suite that large on the floor that I could tell from the map, and it was really unique so a huge plus.

The bedroom was in a separate room to the living area and the bathroom area and I would think this was a great place to stay if you were on any type of work trip. The plug sockets were great, sometimes you go to these places and they have them all set up with the hotels specific sockets and you only have one which was annoying in my previous stay in Barcelona, that I’ll mention later. There were two tv’s and there was a desk, a lounge area. It was a great set up and I liked the decor. I wasn’t at all a fan of the blue cybernetic snowflakes that was on the back of the lounge area but it’s the Hotels branding so I expected it, it just didn’t go as fabulously with the decor which was simple, easy and modern.

So the first thing on the agenda, make sure the receptionist knows that I don’t eat meat, and to find out the details of the hotel from the other hotel staff on the room service options, so I rang the reception and was waiting for 15 minutes for an answer. I redialed, no response. I tried the other options from the room service direct line to the other options. I was told that reception would ring my suite back, I received no calls in 50 minutes of waiting. I was busying myself as I wanted to get changed and feel a bit more comfortable after my rainy stroll to the location, but there was absolutely no response. So I went downstairs and explained to the receptionist in person, that I had tried to reach them and had no reply, the other phone assistants had told me I would receive a call back and she apologised and offered me my choice of room service for the evening.

Off I went back upstairs, to then place my order of room service. I wanted something easy like some tortilla style chips and some diet coke. I had no information about the hotel that I could locate in the room and I had seen a sign for a spa, but the room service who were the only people who were available to answer my questions had told me this was actually not set up for clients yet, as it was a new build, but there was a pool. So I waited for the food to arrive and the individual that brought the food demanded that I pay for the room service the receptionist had offered me, and I was just flabberghasted. I explained again I was there to review the Pride menu and I had still not experienced a tour of the lounge that I was meant to have it in, nor did I have my choice of food explained clearly, as I didn’t know the Pride menu options and wanted to ensure it was vegan. He told me he would be off to talk to his manager and then returned to say that it was all fine, but I was really quite dissapointed at that point because it seemed that there was a huge breakdown in communication between the reception and the rest of the hotel and I don’t think it looked particularly great.

Anyway, I got on with some work and fell asleep as this was quite late in the night now, and experienced the bath which was fabulous. There was awesome products from Elemis and I thought it was again a lovely touch. I was watching the traffic and the view is undeniable, the suite is very lovely but again, the bed was just not that great and I found the linen extremely fluffy for that particularly evening, which was very hard to sleep in. There was also a lot of noise that you wouldn’t expect that high up in a building. It was mostly from what I could tell, from other rooms in the hotel and I really was lost as to who to contact to ask about it because the reception was just inactive in my calls.

So I set my alarm early the next morning and went for a stroll to the spa, I saw it was a very clean but moderate pool space which I thought was a nice touch, but the spa was not open and was very much a case of two rooms preparing to be finshed for an inhouse experience. I went to the top floor to attend the Lounge in which I was expecting breakfast and my card wouldn’t allow me access, I asked the man dropping off extra coffee from room service what I was supposed to do and he told me he wasn’t sure. I completely had had enough by that point so I attempted to find out how to check out on the television screen, which was advertising an option to do so. I then rang room service who had been excellent in comparison to the reception and I spoke to a lady who had been fully prepped of my Pride menu review. She offered a list of assortments and I thought that she was explaining the entire menu - she actually sent them all to the room on a huge trolly with a young man, and they were kind enough to take a photo of me in the view which was awesome. If I had just had the access to the reception as you’d expect and was able to get that info, get some alternative bedding and just had a proper understanding of what the hotel had to offer, I would have been over the moon with all the great touches, but It just felt a bit tainted by the inefficiency of the reception.

I would have absolutely loved to visit the sky lounge and find out more about the spa, but it was a bit of a wacky experience and I had a meeting midday, so I hope you guys appreciate my honesty in writing this. The Pride review is here again. Did I love the suite? No question. It was a high end room and view. Room service was excellent, the pool was a lovely touch. When the spa opens they’ll have some great resources for tired out work people, which I think is an excellent demo for this type of hotel. Overall I would have given this a 4 out of 5 on the LGBT inclusive options, a 5 out of 5 on the view, a 1 out of 5 for the reception and a 3.5 out of 5 for the hotel itself. I think we’ll go for a 3 out of 5 overall and I am being a bit more critical because I was so looking forward to that Pride menu and I actually think that I missed out on half of the menu because I got no avocado or basil toast which they’ve listed on their site + I got a hundred other options I didn’t want haha!

So let me know if you’ve had any strange experiences with hotels in the comments below.