Chic Villa 6

“Lovely hotel, but don't stay here! Loud, expensive and far from everything.”

We chose this place based on the glowing reviews on Booking.com. I now believe these are fraudulent and I am pursuing this with Booking. To be sure this is a lovely hotel, it has a nice shared pool, good breakfast and fantastic staff. Unfortunately, it is in a terrible location for touring Chian… more

We chose this place based on the glowing reviews on Booking.com. I now believe these are fraudulent and I am pursuing this with Booking. To be sure this is a lovely hotel, it has a nice shared pool, good breakfast and fantastic staff. Unfortunately, it is in a terrible location for touring Chiang Mai in more ways than one. The hotel literature boasts that it is 4 miles from the airport. Sure, but it will take you 45 minutes to go those 4 miles. We visited in between Christmas and New Year's, a busy time for tourism, compounded by a national holiday. This doesn't change the fact that the taxi drivers didn't know where the hotel was located, even after getting directions on their phones. Not only that, but when we were in the old city, taxi drivers would charge us a lot more due to the distance and inconvenience of getting us to this place. Uber even cost us $8. Another unfortunate location fact: this hotel is in the flight path of the busy airport. You'll clearly hear planes, even in the shower while the AC is on. And they fly until after midnight and start up again just before 6. Good luck with that night's sleep! The construction of the villa is such that you can hear everything - people talking in a conversational tone outside - yes! Someone using the bathroom in another part of the villa - yes! A scooter approaches the hotel on the street - yep! It's an echo chamber. Now, I've never stayed in Chiang Mai proper, maybe it's super-loud there too, but I'd take my chances there versus staying so far away from all you want to see and do. To be sure it is a large space for a family, with the villa we had containing 2 spacious bedrooms, a small family room, a somewhat functional kitchen (it had plates and silverware but no bowls, pots, bottle opener, kitchen towels, etc.) and was spotlessly clean. The hotel site says it has a restaurant, but all it has is a bar where you'll pay $2 for a Coke. The staff will order food for you, but that's not the same as eating a meal at a restaurant. Breakfast was made to order, eggs, French toast or pancakes, with a small buffet of yogurts, pastries and fruit on the side. Again the staff was fantastic, and I'd probably rate this a 2 without them. They kept our stay from being a complete bummer, but choose another place. This one is overpriced and not at all what you want in Chiang Mai.

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