More about Danubius Hotel Regents Park
Danubius Hotel - Convenient location
by TripAdvisor Member nuddsy
We have just spent 3 nights at the Danubius having stayed there several times previously when it was under different management. (its changed hands loads of times in the past few years). The hotel has several plus points - it has car parking, is outside the congestion charging zone, rooms are OK and with air conditioning and there is a bus stop opposite the hotel with frequent buses in and out of the city to late in the night. There is a little convenience store next door that sells London transport passes. There is also a coffee shop which looked nice next door to the hotel and I noticed a few of the hotel guests eating in there.
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The car parking is a bit pricey at £18 for a 24 hour period and you need to be careful with timings as the 24 hour period runs from 12pm - 12pm and odd hour over that is £3 per hour. However we just parked the car and left it there so that offset the congestion charge of £8 a day to go into the city and it is only about 10 minutes by bus to Marble Arch.
We can still remember the decor from when it was the Regents Park Hilton many years ago so it is getting a bit faded although not tatty but the rooms are clean and so are the public areas. If you like cricket it has great views over Lords if you are high enough up.
The breakfasts are OK but there's not a great deal of choice and they have become quite watchful over who is only entitled to a continental breakfast and make a big issue over which end of the buffet counter you can use although I did sneak a slice of bacon and some scrambled egg on my plate I felt I was being watched. The staff in the breakfast room drove me to distraction- attentive service is one thing but they are over zealous and snatch your plate away the split second you put your knife and fork down and before you have even swallowed the last mouthful. If I had been there any longer I would have had to say something.
On convenient location alone, if you have a car its worth staying there and we would stay there again.
Excellent Hotel!
by TripAdvisor Member Chernov
We stayed in a standard double room at the Danubius Hotel for five nights in August and one additional night separately – after short trip to Edinburgh. So we have seen two standard double rooms. It was excellent stay!
The rooms were very clean and good equipped. The room size is even bigger than should be in four stars hotel.
The staff was very friendly and helpful.
The location was also good, especially for arrival from Stansted Airport – The "National Express" coach stops with distance of 20 m from Danubius.
The Continental Breakfast was rich and tasty.
We would definitely go back to this hotel again, and would recommend it to anyone.
Great hotel
by TripAdvisor Member slaj147
This was an excellent hotel for the money. We stayed there for 4 nights and were pleasantly surprised. There is a 24 hour kitchen and bar here which was great on our first night as we were getting over our jet lag. The rooms are a decent size for London and even have a mini fridge in them. There are only 5 channels on the tv but we didnt mind because we didnt come to London to watch tv. The nearest tube is St Johns Wood, about a 7 - 10 minute walk from the hotel. The beakfast at the hotel is your standard continental breakfast and is ok. There is a little cafe around the corner from the hotel but I wouldnt recommend it. We picked up stuff at the little market next to the cafe to eat on the run for something quick. The staff were friendly and helpful. The concierge could answer all our questions and give us great directions. I would definitely stay here again.
Very good hotel
by TripAdvisor Member josejosejose
A very relaxing 4-star A class hotel. Rooms are spacious, clean, and nicely decorated. I stayed there for 5 nights. Excellent value for money. Customer sevice is good,. I especially liked food room service, I remember ordering the seafood mix platter and my partner ordered salmon. They were delicious, and come in a really big proportion. The hotel also has a very relaxing spacious office available for its guests to use anytime, and which includes internet. Internet costs 1 pound only (for 15 minutes) - which is excellent when you compare it to other hotels such as Holiday inn Express which charged me around 4-6 pounds for one-time half an hour!! Tube station is around 18 minutes away, just exit the hotel from its back entrance door (through the pub), and keep walking straight up ahead. You can cut the distance by taking the bus if u liked.
Can be a very nice place
by A TripAdvisor Member
I write hotel reviews for a living, and it is often the case that what is written about a hotel and how it actually is, are two different things. Now obviously when I visited this hotel they were aware of the fact that I would be writing about the quality of the hotel later so as you can imagine, they would bviously make that extra effort to give me a nice room.
The room I recieved was a double room on the top floor of the hotel with beautiful views across the Lords Cricket Ground, I was very impressed. The room was a good size, with plenty of room to walk around. The bathroom was also a reasonable size but the flush on the toilet didn't work properly (a common fault with most hotels it seems.) I was happy with the room apart from the air conditioning was broken and i couldn't turn it down, so I had to roast with the windows open, joy.
The dining area was beautiful, I was really impressed. However, the buffet breakfast was much to be disired. Now I've worked a Travelodge previously (it happens) so I know how the food is cooked and that a hotel at the Danubius' standard should be alot higher, but to be honest it was just as bad. The cooked food was overcooked and hard, and there wasn't all that much choice. Maybe I arrived late, but all the same, I paid just as much as the person who got there first in the queue. The cereals and juices were well presented and I had no problems with it.
The Regents Park hotel is beautiful, the rooms are excellent if your lucky (I've read ppl have had bad experiences), and sometimes the service isn't all that polite I've found. Apart from that, I'd use visit this hotel again and hope for the same quality again.
Profs tour
by A TripAdvisor Member
I met a buisness friend from Austria we had been to the Hotel when it was the Ramada Plaza she was adventurous and wanted the sights of the West End theatres I wanted Cricket.
Under the very structure of the Hotel is a four track underground system, the staff actualy showed me the door at the bottom of the vehicle entrance ramp that leads directly to an old abandoned Station, the noise morning noon and night from thundering trains was rediculous.
The Oriental Restaraunt in the basment was too highly priced and the food was cold.
High quality, but some rough edges
by TripAdvisor Member John_Freeman
The Danubis Hotel, just 10 minutes from St. John's Wood and close to Regent's Park used to be a Ramada Hotel but is now owned by the Hungarian hotel chain, Danubis.
Once state owned the Danubis Hotels were privatised on the continent some time ago; but our stay at its first London accquisition could in part be better associated with old jokes about communist hospitality.
The room was excellent (if small for the price compared with other London hotels I have stayed in); and kept very clean. Unfortunately a noisy heating/ air conditioning unit (reported but not, I think, fixed) did not make for a good night's sleep; and the central lifts are very noisy, so I would advise anyone considering staying here to ask for a room well away from them.
Language problems with foreign, East European reception staff also prompted frustration; considering the outgoing MD of the chain prides himself on his knowledge of languages (including Mongolian) it was annoying not to be able to make myself understood. While my requests were trivial (room keys issued that did not work, for example, trying to access the fitness centre and not being given the correct information to do so), this could be worrying when it comes to more important matters.
I would also have to say I found the in house restaurant very disappointing; while there it was clear some changes were afoot so perhaps food quality will improve. Suffice to say here, our one evening meal was very disappointing (I would recommend Richaux or Sofras in St. John's Wood as alternatives); and expensive (my suggested alternatives are also expensive, but at least the food there was good). If breakfast is not included in your room rate then go elsewhere: I think £15 per head for breakfast is outrageous, even for a four star hotel.
The Danubis has all the trappings and potential of a very good hotel; I am not sure how long it has been in its current owner's hands, but I think it can only get better. Certainly every member of staff we encountered tried to be helpful (despite the aforementioned language difficulties) and this, I think, is the establishment's best asset.
Absolutely disgusting,dirty,rude,horrible staff
by TripAdvisor Member al_and_niki
As a valentines present for my girlfriend i decided to take her to london and see the lion king, as a treat i thought we would stay at a hotel close by, a nice one at that.
the web site said that this hotel was very close to the main theatres. it was nearly 45 minutes on 2 different tubes, not to mention the 30 minutes it took to walk from the hotel to the station, and then from the station to the theatre.
it cost £156 for the both of us to stay there one night, i have paid less than that in 5 star hotels in the maldives, so i expected some luxury. i was sadly mistaken.
i am by no means a fussy person, alls i ask for is a nice, clean hotel room with friendly and attentive staff. What i got was absolutely disgusting. The carpets in the room were stained by tea, coffe, tobacco, and the bed had some distinctive stains which looked very similar to bodily fluids.
It was a hot day and the windows were both broken, this coupled with the smelly room was just unbearable. We decided to go downstairs to the resturant. In all fairness the food was lovely and the main reception and resturant were absolutely lovely, very lavish and what you would expect for your money. The service however wasnt. We waited 45 minutes for 2 sandwiches, as i said befor im not very fussy but three quaters of an hour to make 2 bloody sandwichs is unbelievable when there was only one other persone in the whole place.
The staff were so rude, the 2 people on reception could barely be bothered to even check us in. As soon as we arrived at the check in desk the two ladies were having a conversation and didnt even acknowledge us. we waited nearly 5 minutes before they would turn around, only to be greeted by a filthy look.
we were made to feel very unwelcome, thats all i can say about the staff really. Just out and out rude.
Back to the state of the room: it stunk of smoke, the carpet was filthy, the bed was uncomfortable and covered in stains. The decoration was outdated. The wallpaper was stained by tobacco.
We decided the next day to visit London zoo, which is only supposed to be a 5 minute walk away, we thought that despite the sheer rudeness of the ladies on reception the previous day we would ask them for some help with directions. Again a big mistake, she acted like Kevin and Perry, a rude teenager. We felt guilty for dragging her away from her coffee and her chat.
She obviously couldnt be bothered to help us, she handed us a map and pointed rougly to where it was. I was not happy to say the least.
One saving grace was that the baggage guy was really cheerful, helpfull, smiling and shock of all shocks could speak more than pigeon english. A real credit to a disgusting cheap and nasty hotel, i really hope he gets a job somehwere else becuase they really dont deserve to have him working there.
I knew before going to this hotel that it was owned by Hungarians, and was expecting hungarian people to work there. I am not a typical english man who expects everyone to speak english when he goes on holiday, but when i visit a hotel in england, in london i expect the staff to be able to have some kind of conversation with me, more than please and thank you, not that we ever heard that except from the baggage guy.
I have looked through the reviews on this site for this hotel and i am truely shocked, maybe we just had the worst room in the hotel. I really hate looking at needlessly bad reviews on this site, but i can tell you with my hand on my heart that this is the worst hotel and the worst staff i have ever ever ever experienced in my whole life.
The only thing i can recommend to you is to stay in a travel lodge or one of the other cheap hotels because at least they are clean and basic, and their staff will have some form of customer service skills.
I genuinely hated the experience of staying here, i would recomend sleeping rough compared to staying here, again i cannot stress enough the importance of avoiding this awefull dingy smelly sickly hotel.
