Stayed in a superior sea view room, which was pleasantly clean, fresh & welcoming. Toiletries provided were also of a good quality. The view from the room was quite amazing, although we didn't have enough time to explore, due to having arrived quite late at night & having departed quite early the following morning.

The breakfast was very good. The dinner menu lacks vegetarian options. Walked to a local restaurant not too far away, which enabled us to experience the local vibe.

This is nice hotel, with good sized rooms and facilities. It is rather isolated in the middle of open land with good of the bay, but will disappear surrounding land has been developed and we enjoyed the quietness and found it was convenient to get to the ferry point for bay tours. There are small shops nearby but no alternative places for western food to compete with the hotel restaurant. The food in the hotel is rather limited in choice. In spite of the. The city of Ha Long however, is about 4-5 kms away.

The hotel location is good, and very quiet. The saffs are very nice and usefull. Room and restromm are clean, but thay are so small, I think, this hotel is 3 stars instead of 4 stars. The pool and gym are small, pool very small and dirty, this gym is not 4 stars standard like others. around 16 metter square, it is not a gym. The price is so high. This hotel is 3 stars.

.....Unless you want to pay 4 star prices for a 2 star hotel (without the 2 star service)

ok where do i start ......

its a lovely hotel on first impressions .... if you ignore the fact you are surrounded by building sites and rubble and general mess .... yes, you can see the bay if you have binoculars. The reception area is lovely, and despite being very dissapointed about the location, it seemed it would live up to its 4 stars.

Howver, thats where it ends. We attempted to check in ....we had paid via a travel agency for one night , and had booked another nights stay, however on arrival after around 20 mins of what can only be described as faffing about they said we needed to pay cash why i dont know ... this is alledgedlly a 4 star international hotel. in addition, they asked for the same rates we had paid via the travel agency (with booking fee) when the cost of the room was clearly marked as less in reception. When we asked why, they said 'we give you fruit in your room' to which we replied 'thats ok, we dont want fruit' ... cue more faffing.

We told them we could only pay by visa, and they swiped the card the wrong way, which read card error, and would not put it through again. by this point, we were starting to get pretty annoyed as it had been a long journey from Hue that morning. They gave us the key and said that we could pay after we were settled.

upon reaching the 5th floor we were met by the overwhelming smell of paint as they were repaining all the corridors - its unlucky that we chose their week of renevations to stay, but again, another thing to put us off.

The room itself was fine. Minibar, decent sized bathroom.

We had a look through the hotel guide - as this place is in the middle of nowhere we wanted to see what options we had in the hotel to eat. We began with the skybar, which opens at 5pm.

We sat for around 15 mins in a completely unattended bar before someone appeared ... also the wine list was incorrect, from all the choices available, only one bottle was left.

we ate out that night, but decides to spend the next day by the pool, and take advantage of the poolside bar as decribed in the guide (2nd floor) where we could enjoy drinks, snacks and sandwhiches.

This bar does not exist!!!! what we actually forund was a bit of a grubby pool area ... 4 wooden uncomfortable sunloungers, without cushions, no bar of any description and no one around whatsover (despite this also being the floor where the spa, sauna, beauty rooms etc are) when i went to reception to ask where the bar was - showing the description on the leaflet, i was told sorry. no bar and was shrugged at.

We have stayed in 2 star hotels which are of a far higher standard and been very happy and wanted to treat ourselves to a bit of luxury this time and were very dissapointed. to be expected to pay $100 (75 english pounds) was unacceptable - if we hadnt already paid, we would have certainly left the hotel to find better accomodation.

Further into town for the same price there are some far better hotels. we certainly learned our lesson.