When I arrived at the hotel via the free bus shuttle from East Station and entered my suite, I was pleasantly surprised how large and comfortable it was. Coming from Hong Kong, where the hotel rooms are among the smallest you can get anywhere on the planet, I suddenly stood in a suite which was at least four times as big - and that for only about 73 Euros per day.
The suite was located on the sixth floor and seemed to have been refurbished quite recently. It had marble floors in the living room and the working area, two televisions (one in the living room and one in the bedroom), three phones, one of them with a fax and a free braodband internet connection. The living room and the bedroom have separate air conditions. The windows are quite well isolated against street noise. So I was able to sleep without ear plugs.
The rooms are cleaned twice a day and on every floor you will find a woman sitting at a desk to help you if you have any problems. Having the bed made twice a day is almost to much for my taste, as I prefer to have as much privacy as possible and do not want the room maids to enter my room too often.
I have already stayed in many hotels, but never took anything from the minibars, as it was always much too expensive. In this hotel the minibar prices were so low, that I almost emptied it. I guess that might also be the case in most chinese hotels though.
At night I found some downpoints. While the sheets and the cushions were nicely soft and comfortable like you do not find it very often in hotels of that price category, the mattresses were among the firmest I have ever experienced. Another downpoint were the buttons for the night lamps. The buttons for both lamps were located on one side of the bed, were the buttons for the whole bedroom and the working desk were also located. The buttons were not illuminated and so it was not very easy to find the right button, if you wanted to get up at night. That was a minor problem though.
At night the building is brightly illuminated from the outside, so it will only get dark in your room if you close the curtains.
The location of the hotel was quite nice. Guangzhou it in the process of building an impressive 4 kilometre (2.5 miles) long main axis and China Mayors Plaza is located just two buildings from CITIC Plaza, the tallest building of Guangzhou (before the two 432m tall gate towers and the more than 600m tall tv tower will be completed) and main focal point at the northern part of the axis. On many Guangzhou postcards you will find the two golden towers near CITIC plaza. The hotel is located in the smaller tower. A subway entrance for the Metro Line 3 is just around the corner. After just one stop you reach Tianhe Road with its giant shopping malls, but it is also no problem to walk to Tianhe Road. If you prefer using a taxi to explore the city, it is just a matter of seconds rather than minutes to catch one in front of your hotel. Taxis in Guangzhou are about as cheap as the subway in European cities.
If your room has windows to the south, you will get an unobstructed view you will not find in many places in such a dense city. When looking out of your window, you really have the feeling of "sitting in the first row".
The top floors of the building host offices and there are no separate elevators for the hotel and the office floors. So you can meet an intersting mixture of hard working office workers and relaxed tourists in the elevators. That was quite unusual, but in no sense disturbing. The four elevators were more than sufficient for a building of that size.
They have a great and inexpensive breakfast buffet, so unlike in many European hotels, you do not waste money by having breakfast at your hotel. They deliver your breakfast to your room at a time of your choice, if you fill out the breakfast order and place it at the door handle outside your room.
Overall, China Mayors Plaza is a nice hotel with very much attention to detail. Staff is very helpful and if I had complained, I am quite sure that they had even solved my problem with the firm beds. Although all the major hotel chains will open new hotels in Guangzhou very soon, I will very likely chose China Mayors Plaza on my next stay again.
This review is the subjective opinion of a TripAdvisor member and not of TripAdvisor LLC
