Try to negotiate for the superdeluxe room for a normal tariff and you have excellent value

After a rough 10 hour public bus trip from Bagan to Mandalay we were keen to avoid a budget hotel & spend a little bit more for some R&R. The Emerald Land Inn is a decent enough hotel that certainly tries hard to meet tourist standards since they were charging an arm & a leg. Without a reservation we decided to have a crack at getting a room, we turned up & negotiated for a $60 Deluxe room which was the price on the DirectRooms website down to $45 USD which was great. Staff spoke good english & were very accommodating.

The hotel's grounds were quite nice & lush with a decent pool & very fancy dinning area. Our room had high ceilings, a separate vanity area & shower-tub. We had aircon & a ceiling fan, the furnishings were of a pretty good standard & there was free wireless but only within the vicinity of the reception area but expect pre-historic dial-up speed.

Some negatives: On the pamphlet it states that the hotel offers free airport transfers, this was not the case anymore due to a new airport about 1 hr away, they organised a taxi for us which cost $13 USD. The hotel no longer has any satellite TV but after a bit of arm-twisting they offered us a DVD player with Sigourney Weaver's Aliens, wicked! The hotel was in a residential area & located somewhat near the royal palace but still not near enough to walk, it is just a matter of walking the few minutes to the main road to hail down a bicycle taxi. Our room rate did include breakfast which was ok but not buffet & the bread seemed a little stale.

For those politically & socially inclined, im not sure if this was a government-run hotel, i doubt it as it wasnt very near the city centre but I would guess they pay taxes & kick-backs to the junta for having the permission to list themselves on the internet for foreign guests.

I was very happy in this hotel. The breakfast was more than adequate - I had no complaints. Quite a haven to come back to in the evening. Good hot showers - air-con worked - very comfy bed - slept like a baby! I would stay there again but, was not very struck on Mandalay so do not expect to return there.

Having booked trough a reputed agency, Gulliver, we had excelent realtionship quality-price the whole tour, but in Mandalay, at the Emerald Inn. Two horrible nigths with the air con broken, then cold shower in the morning, no heather working, but the worst thing was breakfast. Not just warm papaya juice or warm papaya juice; the eggs or eggs were fried on burnt toxic oil, absolutely uneatable, bread the worst ever. You don't eat there, you're just feeded as an uncared animal. Breaking all wonderful experiences before and after in Myanmar. Not to mention the bad location far away of anything. Do not accept this place in your tour !!