Hotel Gran Bilbao

“Amazing for celiacs”

Lovely room, lovely staff, lovely view but moreover excellent for coeliacs or those with gluten sensitivity. Best breakfast I’ve had in eight years away: I was given a comprehensive overview of what was and was not suitable, freshly prepared bread (that was actually lovely). Felt very safe and ha... more

Lovely room, lovely staff, lovely view but moreover excellent for coeliacs or those with gluten sensitivity. Best breakfast I’ve had in eight years away: I was given a comprehensive overview of what was and was not suitable, freshly prepared bread (that was actually lovely). Felt very safe and had excellent service from the hotel staff. Can’t recommend enough.

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“Fantastic place!!”

I was so lucky to find this elegant hotel. Clean and so happy with the room. Great bed with a big beautiful clean bathroom!! The reception guy was so sincere he upgraded my room. The real game changer was the OUTSTANDING BREAKFAST!!!! I will return here for sure!! The location is perfect with ... more

I was so lucky to find this elegant hotel. Clean and so happy with the room. Great bed with a big beautiful clean bathroom!! The reception guy was so sincere he upgraded my room. The real game changer was the OUTSTANDING BREAKFAST!!!! I will return here for sure!! The location is perfect with a nice walk to the old city!!

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“Great hotel”

We at yes in this hotel April 2024. This is a really nice hotel. It's slightly out of town but don't let this put you off. There is plenty of local transport nearby. 77 bus stops right outside the hotel and the metro is a 7-8 min walk. The only think regarding location the hotel is situated near... more

We at yes in this hotel April 2024. This is a really nice hotel. It's slightly out of town but don't let this put you off. There is plenty of local transport nearby. 77 bus stops right outside the hotel and the metro is a 7-8 min walk. The only think regarding location the hotel is situated near an uphill for walking to the metro. Maybe tricky if you have a wheelchair or struggling to walk etc. We got the bus to the hotel. Bus A3247 from outside airport. You can buy tickets from kiosk or on the bus. Once in the centre we got another bus 77 that takes you directly outside the hotel. Hotel is very clean and nice we stayed 4 nights. We checked in online so was speedy just got room allocated on arrival saved messing around as we had children with us. The room is well equiped with toiletries and very comfortable and clean. Free water stations around the hotel. The breakfast was excellent loads of choice for everyone. Only downside was evening meal. The food was not very nice. The pad Thai was made poor and very dissspointed. However don't let this put you off there are other restaurants nearby. We would definitely come back again

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“Funky (with dogs!)”

Really funky hotel, unusual interiors which are a lot of fun! My children had a blast trying out all the arty chairs and the 'tropical' lounge area which made for some very entertaining photos... We had a family room on a higher floor facing the much-photographed 'viaduct view' - the room was hu... more

Really funky hotel, unusual interiors which are a lot of fun! My children had a blast trying out all the arty chairs and the 'tropical' lounge area which made for some very entertaining photos... We had a family room on a higher floor facing the much-photographed 'viaduct view' - the room was huuuge and the bathroom equally so, definitely enough space for a family of 4, although the children's bunk-bed was slightly alarming in that there was quite a big gap from the wall to the edge of the mattress so we had to request extra pillows to 'plug' this as worried about the child on the top bunk (hotel rep assured us that this was perfectly normal but the bunk bed was a unit type that you wheel in and dismantle so really not sure how sturdy it was? would have preferred more solid permanent furniture or simply single beds). We stayed for 2 nights and opted for the hotel breakfast for one of our mornings: again, I would say it deserves the hype as literally every breakfast item you could possibly wish for was available and all to a high quality including (amongst many other items on offer) an omelet chef cooking to your specifications, cute individual bottles of 2 x smoothies, smorgasbord of pastries including Spanish delicacies and a real honeycomb to which you could help yourself, the latter very impressive. Indeed, it was hard to tear yourself away from all the food! As others have noted, the hotel is located on a hill and about a 12-15 minute walk away from the old city centre and further to the art district. We had no problem navigating the walk but I can appreciate it may be a bit burdensome for other travellers so please take note. The hotel has underground parking available marked by floor/room but there is an extra cost involved; free parking at your risk is around the corner of the hotel but there were no spaces available when we tried to find one... A few things which we found a bit of an annoyance and hence this review is marked down: there were no individual toiletries in the bathroom, instead it was furnished with screwed-in bottles of shampoo, body wash etc which were ok but quite difficult to use and lacked the personal touch. Secondly, when driving into the car-park there were a lot of guest smokers outside who were tardy in getting out of the way, they sort of blocked the entrance-way so I suggest a simple solution for hotel management is to just restrict the immediate area around the entry-ramp and this will also help with the abundance of second-hand smoke being ingested. Finally, this is a dog-friendly hotel which is great for dog-owners but in my opinion they took over the ground floor reception and lounge area of the hotel too much and some of the communal corridors/lifts smelled distinctly 'doggy' and musty. Please don't forget about the guests who do not wish to be accosted by the sights and sounds of canines as we are paying customers too!

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