Review of my stay at Albion Hotel, Peroutkova, Prague
I stayed at this hotel as part of an Easy Jet holiday for three nights (12th, 13th and 14th September 2011) and this is an account of my stay there. I cannot say if this hotel operates permanently as it did when I stayed but I recommend that you read this to evaluate whether you want to take the chance!
I arrived on Monday afternoon at around 17.30 and checked in. I was met with a distinctly unwelcoming attitude by the girl on the check in desk. I do not know if this was because I was English or whether, in the ten seconds she had known me, she had decided that she didn’t like me.
This hotel comprises four accommodation blocks (A, B, C and D) and I was given a room on the seventh floor of B block. Once you leave the glitz of the lobby area, the shine fades as you walk through yellow corridors which appear to have last seen fresh paint sometime in the nineteenth century. The lift worked and I arrived on the seventh floor of B block and located my room on the left hand side at the end of the corridor. I found the room to be basic but comfortable and clean. As the corridors only have a window at the narrow end, they are quite dark and timer light switches are placed along the corridor. On my corridor, the lights did not work so I had to tread carefully to avoid anything which may have been left outside the door of a room.
I went out and returned to the hotel at around 21.00 when I thought that I would visit the “Beer Pub”. I was stopped from entering at the door by some sort of chef who rudely demanded to see my room card. I showed it to him and he made noises of disapproval as I had not brought the room card envelope with me. After explaining that I just wanted to buy a beer, he let me past. The “Beer Pub” is actually just the breakfast room with one beer tap. I approached the “bar” and requested a beer. The barman indicated immediately that the beer pump was not working and that if I bought a bottle of beer, I would have to supply the correct change in Koruna as the till was not working either. Brilliant!
I visited the Lobby Bar afterwards and this was fine. 40CZK for a bottle of beer, quite reasonable for a hotel I thought. I took my beer into the “Summer Garden” and sat down. The Summer Garden is a small patio area sandwiched between two of the accommodation blocks with a water feature. It was at this point that I made a correlation between something that I had seen earlier and what I was seeing now. Upon arrival, there had been five or six coaches in the car park but I had thought nothing of it. It was now apparent that the coaches had been the transport for hundreds of youths who now had all the room windows open shouting, screaming and wailing!
I went up to the room at around 22.30 and it seemed that all the rooms on my corridor were now occupied by people around the age of 18 shouting, squealing, screaming and wailing. This went on most of the night with doors opening and slamming on a regular basis. The corridor effectively became a social gathering area for the unruly selfish youths. The thought crossed my mind that, given the attitude of the girl on reception when I checked in, she may have assigned me to this room intentionally. I cannot say for certain, but I am quite sure that I was the only guest in this corridor that was not part of the coach party.
I complained at reception the next morning and I was told that it was “student season”. I pointed out that there are signs on the corridor walls indicating that disturbances between the hours of 22.00 and 06.00 will not be tolerated. He said that all he could offer was the services of the security officer if I called in to reception when it happened again. No offer of an alternative room was made.
Once again, I visited the Lobby Bar in the evening and was surprised to learn that the same beer was 50 CZK tonight (10 CZK more than the previous night).
The experience of this night was similar to that of the previous one with some variations. Someone was banging on a pipe which I imagine would have traveled through most of the block and, for some of the night, the room next to mine became the “community centre”. I phoned down to reception at around midnight and security was allegedly dispatched. When things were the same at around 00.30, I got dressed and went down to reception. I demanded another room explaining that I can cope with one sleepless night but not two. I was supposed to be on holiday! There was one man and one woman on reception and, by the time the man had finished saying that the hotel was full and there were no spare rooms, the woman had prepared a new room key and handed it to the man to give to me. Apparently, this hotel has the extraordinary ability to accommodate you in rooms that do not exist! He then proceeded to explain that this room was in block A and that there were no students in block A. I asked why I had not been accommodated in block A initially and he offered no reason. As you know, I have my own suspicions. The room in block A was quiet and I slept for the first time since arriving at this hotel.
I skipped breakfast the next morning as the students were crowded around the buffet like locusts. Most of the buffet had gone and it appeared that no-one was going to be bothered to replenish it. I moved my things from the room in block B and handed the old room key in at reception and I was greeted with the same look of repulsion and silence.
I visited the Lobby Bar on my last evening and was pleased to see that the beer had returned to its original price once again. I mentioned this to the barman and he explained that I was mistaken and he showed me the till receipt which clearly stated 40CZK. I can only conclude that the gentleman the previous evening was applying his own “barman’s tax”.
My sleep on my last night was only broken twice, the first time by what I can only assume was a bus load of lager louts leaving on a bus from the front of the hotel at around 23.30 and then at around 03.00 on their return.
I have stayed at many hotels around the world ranging from 3* to 5* plus and I have never been so glad to leave as I was when I checked out of this one. This appears to be a hotel which accommodates mainly coach tours at the expense of the normal traveler. The hotel management appears to lack the inclination or the capacity to exercise any control over the behaviour of the groups to which they offer accommodation.
- Albion Hotel Prague
