More about Holiday Inn Express Hotel
Location excellent - everything else fine if not exceptional
by A TripAdvisor Member
Stayed here on the San Diego leg of our honeymoon last June due to the Trip Advisor reviews. Not madly impressive from the outside, but the location adjacent to the freeway is excellent, as is the 10 minute walk to the Trolley Bus depot in what feels a safe area.
Couple of decent convenience shops, bars and restaurants in the immediate vicinity, though they are slightly more spread out than I imagined from the reviews here.
There is a friendly (if basic) Irish themed bar within a 5 min walk (near a Pizza takeaway), out the back door and up the hill to the right in which we watched the NBA finals where all the local fans were anti-LA Lakers.
The hotel itself is friendly and comfortable, if not particulary posh. The room was fine, with a handy fridge and all other facilities including the pool are fine.
Considering all this the top selling point of this hotel is the location, which means good accessibility to all the main attractions (by car particularly) in the San Diego area.
There is so much to see in the area - it's very well worth a visit.
I'd go back.
A Gem!
by TripAdvisor Member timman19
My wife and I stayed here 3 nights and were very surprised by what we got for the money.
This is not your average Holiday Inn Express and I have stayed in several. It seems that this hotel was bought by someone and converted which is to the benefit of anyone staying here.
The hotel is located a few blocks away from Old Town and a short drive from the airport. You are pretty centrally located here and a short or moderate drive to all of the attractions.
The staff was very friendly and helpful and let us check in two hours early which was very nice of them. The breakfast bar in the morning was well stocked and refilled when necessary. No restaurant here obviously but there are plenty of places a short walk away.
There is a pool that was clean and a nice courtyard if you want to sit outside and enjoy the weather.
We were pleasantly surprised and I recommend this hotel if you are traveling to San Diego.
Great Value and Good Clean Hotel
by A TripAdvisor Member
We travelled from Ireland and booked 2 rooms for 4 Adults and 3 kids whilst visiting family in LA and San Diego and used this hotel as a base to travel to the Zoo, Sea World and the Las Americas Outlet down by the border.
I travel with business fairly regularly and I often stay in Holiday Inns because our company has a deal; consequently, I had expected this HI EXPRESS to be of a much lower standard. I couldn't have been more wrong. I have stayed in much worse Holiday Inns! The location is terrific if you have a car (everyone does in America) to get around to the various sights. It's very handy to the freeway. The rooms were clean and tidy, linen and service fresh and friendly. Breakfast is pretty standard fare, help yourself buffet of pastries, toast, juice and cereal - not brilliant but ok and it can be a bit of a scramble for tables. But on the whole this is perfect if you need somewhere safe, clean and friendly; the pools not bad either!
Well above it's class
by TripAdvisor Member Gquad
If you expect a Holiday Inn Express standard, you will be pleasantly surprised. The hotel is clean, well maintained, and very centrally located. The staff very friendly and helpful, and went out of their way to assist you. Breakfast has a nice variety, and there is adequate free parking around the facility. The bathroom had nice upgrades, like the bowed shower curtain for extra room, fluffy towels and great shower head. We chose this place over the 3 star hotel because of the kids.
For great dinning experiences, be sure to try Trattoria La Strada in the Gas Lamp district, The Prado in Balboa park, and for a spectacular sunset dinner overlooking the Pacific, go to George’s by the Cove in La Jolla.
Dine With Shamu was a huge disappointment (you see the whale for 3 seconds)
nice place
by A TripAdvisor Member
I have been staying at the Holiday Inn Express in Old Town for several years now. At least 8 or 9 times. Every time I have had a great expiriance. The staff are wonderful. The rooms, while maybe a bit small are clean and comfortable. Parking is great and the general location is great. I fell I can go for evening walks and not be threatened. I plan to stay there again on my trip next week.
Great location, clean hotel
by TripAdvisor Member JessLM
I was pleased with the quality of this hotel, which is located in Old Town, San Diego, a fun but touristy part of town. The room was clean and provided all the basic amenities, which is what we were looking for. If I wanted to stay in Old Town again, I would not hesitate to book here.
The hotel includes free continental breakfast with your stay, and we were here on 4th of July weekend, so there were literally about 50-75 people in the breakfast room milling about and trying to get what they wanted to eat. It wasn't that big of a problem though, I just was surprised to see so many people there.
My only complaint is this: I booked the hotel directly through Holiday Inn reservations. When I called (the same morning) they told me that they only had Junior Suites available at $159/night, and as we were a group of 4, that was the only kind of room we could book. When we arrived at the hotel less than 12 hours later, they told us they had standard rooms at $139/night (they were $129 on the website). The lady at the desk really exaggerated though and said the Junior suite is *much* bigger and worth the $20 extra dollars. I said okay. When we got upstairs to our suite, there was a king size bed and a small pullout love seat in a room that wasn't all that big. I called the front desk and said we needed two double beds since we were 4 people, and she said that two people should sleep on the pull out. I told her that I didn't want that, instead I would take the standard room with two doubles. She said okay, come back to the front desk and switch keys. So far, no problem. She said she would credit my card and the difference would show on the bill at check out. Well, lo and behold, when I get the final bill, it was for $170+, because they had erroniously charged me for the junior suite. When I complained about this to the morning staff, she asked me who told me that I could get credited for the room change, I told her who, and she started muttering obscenties about what an idiot the night manager was. Then she asked me "well, she said she would give you the price of the standard room, but did she say she would refund the taxes?" to which I replied, "Usually taxes are a percentage of the base price, and since the base price has lowered, so should the taxes." She went crazy with her calculator for about 10 minutes, trying to figure out what the credit should be.
It was really a minor mess-up but it wasn't handled the best and I thought it was deceiving that they would try to upsell me on a room that wasn't really all that great. Plus then I had to go out of my way to correct their error.
Again, though, overall this is a pleasant hotel with all the basics in a great location. Also, another tip, this hotel charges $10 a day to park in their hotel parking garage. Be advised, however, that parking on the street in this area is free and easy to find. So you don't need to pay unless you absolutely want to be in a garage.
Perfectly nice place
by TripAdvisor Member SteelerFan19335
We just returned from a five day stay at this hotel, and it was a very nice place to stay. Nothing fancy, but all things most people will want from a hotel are there. The room was very clean, the shower was good, and the bed was comfortable (down comforter on the bed which was a nice touch). Looks like they are in the midst of replacing all of the mattresses which is a good sign for visitors in the near future.
The pool was small, but was nice since it was heated (feels good with the cool evenings in SD). There is a hot tub too. Not too many people were using it so that was good. Towels were provided at the pool.
Breakfast was very busy, but they have good cinnamon rolls and hard boiled eggs, so it was more substantial than the usual continental breakfasts you normally find at hotels. As long as you don't arrive too late in the morning there was plenty of food for everyone.
Hotel location was very convenient for Sea World, it was only a 10 minute drive. We skipped the complimentary shuttle since it came back at 5pm, too early for us. The Zoo was a bit further of a drive but not far by any means. Wild Animal Park and Legoland were much further treks north of San Diego.
I didn't know much about Old Town but was pleasantly surprised by how nice the neighborhood was. Lots of good restaurants to choose from (most of them good Mexican food, but our best meal was at Jack & Giulio's Italian restaurant right around the corner from the hotel - try the Chicken Marsala, it was excellent!). The Old Town historic park made for an interesting walk on our last morning there.
Overall, I would definitely recommend this hotel to anyone who is looking for a good, basic place to stay in San Diego.
Noisy, but nice
by A TripAdvisor Member
Very charming and clean rooms. The layout is very interesting, but the multiple hallways causes doors opening and slamming closed all night. A large center brick courtyard is very noisy if anyone is out there during the night for rooms that open to the courtyard. Housekeeping was pushing a laundry cart around on the bricks at 5:00 a.m.
The 2 nights that I stayed there in June there was also a large high school-age group that were very noisy and running around, adding to the noise level. A call to the front desk seemed to quiet things down.
The breakfast was good quality and lots of offerings.
The King room was small but in good condition and clean. The towels were large and fluffy. Really liked the towels.
There was Spanish tile on the floors in the vanity area, which I don't really like, so I just put some towels down to stand on when getting ready.
A really excellent location if you are going to spend time in Old Town, lots of restaurants nearby.
Close to the freeway if you are going to other locations.
Very pleasant stay
by A TripAdvisor Member
Just returned from a visit to San Diego where we stayed at the Holiday Inn Express for 8 nights. We chose it for the price ($139 - $159 a night), the complimentary breakfast, the location in Old Town, and past reviews. We were very happy with our choice, and would definitely stay there again. I would agree with the reviews posted by the last 5 people. Not fancy but nice, Old Town very pleasant to walk around in, lots of shops and restaurants, parking garage very handy, lots of choices at breakfast and they were very quick to refill items even before empty, beds and linens very nice, towels and showerheads great, small frig and microwave in room handy, close access to the interstate, quick to respond when we needed repairs (clogged toilet, clogged sink drain), pool although small was pleasant.
The only negatives to our stay were the following. We bought tickets to the zoo at the front desk. When we checked out, the tickets were billed to our room, but so were charges for using the trolley on a different day, WHICH WE HAD NOT DONE. This was very upsetting and annoying - and there was no proof either way. They did not call me back as they said that they would, so I eventually went to talk to them at the front desk, and they finally took the charges off. Satisfactory resolution, but unpleasant, although she eventually apologized. The other negative was that we had two rooms on the bottom floor, and because of how the hotel is designed, both rooms were very dark. Try for an upper floor, I assume that the rooms would get more light. Having mentioned these things, I still would return with no hesitation, as the rest of the stay was wonderful!
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