Staying in a hotel in the center of any large city comes with certain risks and rewards, and staying in Mexico City without paying a fortune is no different. Just for your personal comparison, we've typically stayed in the Hotel Bamer (on Alemeda Park) for about $45 a night. The Bamer is now closed for conversion to condos. We typically look for a room that is in the $30-50 a night range in Mexico City. Since as missionaries here in Mexico we live only 2 hours north of M.C. it is not a rarity for us to need to stay overnight in the big city and thus we try to avoid pricy rooms for our budget. We value cleanliness and security and location above all else.

My wife and I stayed in the Hotel Suites Michelangelo two nights ago and overall it was a very good experience. As we had business at the U.S. Embassy, the location was incredible...just 5 safe walking blocks away.

However, there's a few things you might want to know ahead of time.

We booked our one night stay through Expedia only 2 nights before staying there. I somehow missed the hotel phone number in the Expedia printout after I had paid for it and I wished I hadn't overlooked it. We were relieved to know that our reservation was on file at the front desk and that there wouldn't be some kind of reservation scam.

I made a dumb mistake in booking the wrong date...exactly one week later. However, the clerk very nervously decided that he had a room for us anyway so he allowed us to stay the night and made a copy of our Expedia printout. This would have been a huge problem for us had he not had any rooms available or if he just said he couldn't give us a room...or made us pay for another night. So, I will give the hotel very high marks on that part of the experience. (I went back down after thinking for a moment and tipped the fellow a couple bucks for his help.)

The room (#601, 6th floor) was large, had a comfortable king bed for our firm sleeping preferences, a minifridge that was nearly cold (I didn't explore the settings on it), had two electric burners, a tea pot, two bowls, two tea cups, two sets of stainlessware, and maybe even a pot or pan. We didn't use any of those things. There was a small microwave too. There were 2 small bottles of water for drinking. If you wanted to drink tea or boil water for noodles or something, you'd probably need to buy more water or take your chances in boiling tap water for at least 20 minutes to be safe.

There was a color TV with cable and a remote. The clerk handed us the remote when we checked in and I handed it back to the morning clerk when we checked out.

We received one key with a very large plastic key chain thingy...about the dimensions of a large palm pilot but thinner. It fit in my jeans pocket but if you were wearing shorts or a dress or had a very small purse you might find this to be a challenge to store on your person.

The room was very clean, and the bathroom was as clean as any I've ever seen in a budget/moderate hotel. The hot water was hot and though the pressure fluctuated a little, the shower was very nice. They included two small bars of soap, two small shampoos, a shoe cleaning cloth, and a disposable shower cap. (You won't always find these simple amenities in hotels in Mexico.)

As with probably 99% of all hotel rooms in Mexico, it was a smoking room. As a non-smoker with some sinus problems, I can say that I've been in worse rooms, but if you're sensitive to this, you would have problems with that. For one night, we survived the odor and we expected that we'd have to endure this in whatever hotel we used.

Oh, and if you're looking at this on Expedia you will see one of several misleading descriptions and I quote, "Smoke-free property." There was a large glass ash tray right in the room. Smoke-free??? Yeah, right!

The only real downsides were related to the Expedia descriptions. Aside from the smoke-free claim, they claimed there was air conditioning which was a feature we were a little suspicious about beforehand. Here's a direct quote from Expedia, "All rooms at the Michelangelo have air conditioning and windows that open." There was no a/c. There were no vents for any type of heating or a/c anywhere in the lobby or our room. There was a portable heater in the room, but in mid-April, the weather outside was close to 90 degrees (25 C) and the room was just plain hot, probably in the low 80's. We had a nice little balcony overlooking the street below and we felt safe leaving the sliding door open all night. However, the air didn't circulate well and there were no fans either. We didn't think to ask the desk if they had any fans but it's possible they might have provided a fan. The worst part is that we eventually were invaded by a few mosquitoes that pretty much ruined any quality sleep we might have enjoyed. Also, as in any city, there was a lot of noise all night long. We heard car alarms, voices, a garbage truck and a tow truck. They must have been towing every car on the street as that went on from about 3 a.m. until 5 a.m. or so. The tow truck made a lot of noise with chains and hooking up cars and backing up with a loud beeper, etc. The garbage truck also stayed a long time and must have been sorting through the garbage or something. One was still there sorting garbage when we walked out of the hotel at 8 a.m. I think in winter we would have slept fine with the sliding door closed.

A suggestion would be to bring one or two mosquito plug-in devices to ward off mosquitoes. You can buy them in any grocery store in Mexico although I don't know where you'd find such a store in downtown Mexico City. We should have thought to do bring a couple of these devices ourselves.

The Expedia site was misleading. It claimed the following:

# Guestrooms have private balconies and separate sitting areas with sofa beds, kitchenettes, and in-room safes.

# A complimentary cooked-to-order breakfast is served each morning; the on-site bar and grill offers room service.

I'm not sure there was a sofa bed in the room. The long narrow sofa didn't look too comfortable for anything, and if it held a bed, I would be surprised as it reminded me of the seats in a pop-up camper...flimsy cushions on a wooden base. There was no "in-room safe." I checked for that.

There is no breakfast, period. I asked specifically about it and was told there was a restaurant next door that serves a breakfast, but the clerk didn't make it sound like it was connected to the hotel in any way. We certainly weren't going to get a "complimentary breakfast." We figured ahead of time that our $63 room would be worth at least $10 just for a free breakfast, so that was a bust. We both enjoyed a donut at Dunkin Donuts (3 blocks away on Reforma) and a cup of coffee for our breakfast which was a treat for us since we don't get to the U.S. very often.

While the room and fixtures were not new-looking, they were in good condition and nothing seemed to be in disrepair.

Overall, this is a decent place to stay and the location is great if you need to visit the U.S. Embassy, the Zona Rosa or just about anything else downtown. There wasn't a convenient Metro stop within a mile or so, so you'll either need to walk a mile if you need the Metro (we got off at the stop called Insurgentes) or take a cab. You're only 1 block off Paseo de Reforma so you won't have any trouble finding a cab. We actually walked to the Ciudadela and to Parque Alemeda...must have been 2 miles or more one-way but we like walking. We ended up walking back down Reforma in the dark around 8 p.m. which we didn't want to do, but it was generally well-lit. There were still lots of business people milling about and a good bit of security in this section. You'll have to decide what you feel is "safe enough" for being on the streets after dark.

Also, if you have young children, I guess you can forget it. We have 7 year-old and 4 year-old boys and I couldn't make the reservation including either or both of them on the Expedia site. Just to see what would happen, I couldn't get into a reservation with more than one child and not younger than 12 years of age. If you have kids, you might not be able to stay here. If you want to stay at a place that doesn't have kids running around or babies crying, maybe this would be a plus for you. Fortunately, we weren't traveling with our kids for once so this worked out for us.

I would have rated this "Above average" had it not been for the many empty promises of a/c, breakfast, smoke-free property, in-room safe, etc. It really was still a good buy, but there's something about being promised things that aren't really there that bothers me. Nonetheless, if we needed to be in that part of Mexico City again, we would consider staying here again.

I hope all these details of our experience are helpful to you. TripAdvisor has become a regular part of our travel planning as the reviews have taken some of the negative surprises out of our many travels. I'm glad we can now submit a review to help you too.