After having been in the Dorint Winterberg for an entire week, I think I have an idea of the hotel in a serial of aspects. Let's briefly explain them:
HOTEL: In general the place is nice and you would easily notice that during summer and snow it most probably meets the expectations of a leisure vacation. But we were there in a very dark, very rainy, very cold november; where the snow, if any, lasted a couple of hours and melted or vanished under more and more rain. In such weather frame, the hotel was dark, very little to do if not going to the pool, or simply staying at the room, or eating. That's all, and after 8 days and 7 nights, you are desperately looking for a change of scenery and finish the holidays in the same way you left home. Sorry to say... but this could have been improved if the hotel anticipated this and offered a more rich spectrum of activities for the guests (in English at least).
ROOM: The room is clean and well furnished. Coffe maker, waterboiler, dishes and the rest are in the kitchenette, but no clock in the room; TV with only German channels and an ununderstable telephone dealing makes it less cozy. Internet is so expensive and not in room (!!!) In my personal case, the beds were unbearably hard and I was happy to have the sleeping couch as alternative for such matrasses. The pillows, funny to say, were all too soft, melting under my head. My husband wants me to mention he instead slept very well on the beds, and hereby I write it down.
RESTAURANTS: We found the food of the Restaurant (affordable one of the ground floor) particularly good. Affordable prices, well served, delicious food. Only small thing is that the menu has little choice and is in German, they dont have ONE translation to any other language and staff doesnt speak a word of another language. They do what they can but not enough for reasonable communication and though they are adequate, they are also a bit dry.
POOL: Good, very strong jacuzzi, nice little pool for children. Sleepery grounds though and the little dinosaur in the children pool must be cleaned... but also the air is very hot and smelling to chlorine... I could stand it one hour, no more.
KINDERCLUB (Children club): When I came here to check this aspect, didnt find any review mentioning these facilities: here it is my feedback for the families with children: The place is big, spacious, well furnished with a serial of games and even a small playground/slide indoor. The outdoor playground is good! Pity that there were not enough children and the assistant even asked us "when we would pick up ours", giving the impression she wanted to close earlier. As everything during this stay the place was too quite and too dark, and too far from the building: we reached it under cold, windy, heavy rain and sometimes found it closed. Oh well...
BREAKFAST: Simply great. The one real "event" of the day, haha.
SAUNA AND WELLNESS: Sauna quite small and hot for what found in other places; massages pretty average but at not too expensive prices. Quality not the best though. The gym space is at the very beginning of the main building (I mention this because it was very hard for me to actually find this space, the hotel is like a sort of labyrinth on stairs); but you can use the very few machines in particular times of the day as the one room for gym is also used for pilates, cardio and other things. So you must find a "schedule" for the machines, which anyway are not many and not very new.
LOCATION: There is no commercial surrounding around the hotel, you must go to Winterberg in order to vary your possibilities for food and shopping and most of the shops are PRICY as hell. Anyway there is a discount supermarket and easy shops as well, look outside the main street. You wont find ONE shop with maternity clothes.
Well, I hope this experience will be useful. The hotel is good but it was a mistake to go on November, and for many little things I couldnt finish to feel myself at ease.
- Dorintresorts Hotel Winterberg
