The staff was helpful and mindful. They helped us with any problems we had and made us enjoy a wonderful experience.

I stayed here for several months while on business.

The price for a normal room is $65 but can be negotiated to $1500 for a month. This is competitive in town but some places for $1500 will include laundry. VIP includes breakfast (that is standard in town) but not laundry.

The restaurant salad made me sick (very sick). The food is tasty but it is not the best food in town at all. The pizza is very strange, and the goat is tough.

The service is quite good. I never had anything stolen. The cleaning-men are very friendly and eager to clean your room. Of course I don't recommend leaving cash lying around.

The internet is good and reaches to the rooms. This is a big perk. It's included in the room fee.

Other posters might talk about the proximity of different hotels. VIP is walking distance to MONUC DDRRR (for the gym and the happy hour) and walking distance to the Rwandan border. It is also about 500 M for accessing the main clubs in town. Most agencies seem to be on the side of town as VIP.

But some agencies are on the other side of town in which case the Stella or Cap Kivu might be better choices.

They have the ability to show three channels at VIP. They never seemingly show english channels. In the mornings sometimes they show incredibly graphic pornography, which indicates to me that that's what the staff do at night. But to be fair, maybe hotel guests request pornography overnight.

Goma is a USD economy. But when you need change they often give it to you in Congolese Francs. If they are giving you change in Congolese francs it is 900 to the USD. If you are paying them in Congolese francs it is 950 to the USD. And if you are paying some members of the staff for something (like laundry) the price becomes 1000 Congolese Francs to the dollar. These are just tiny pieces of money but basically the staff has a nice little skimming policy by giving you dirty congolese francs you don't' want at a rate that they won't accept them back from you at.

I had some problems with one of the desk clerks. He suggested that I was unreasonable to not be interested to date him. He was quite hostile to me.

The shower runs hot almost all the time. There is always power except in the middle of the day when (I guess) the hotel prefers not to run the generator. But at night they always run the generator. When there is no power, there is no water.

Laundry is $1 per piece except underware which is $2.

So overall, a mixed experience. I don't have much to compare it with for the hotels in town seeing as I only stayed at one.

While neither a palace, nor perhaps suitable for VIPs, the VIP Palace is nonetheless a fine place to stay in Goma. I spent a lot of time at the "top" three places, this one, the Ihusi down the road and the Stella on the other side of town. Overall I think this was my favorite.

The Stella had the nicest looking common areas, great dining space overlooking the lake, great coffee and ok looking rooms (I didn't stay overnight here), but it's not only far from town, it's on the other side of Goma's terrible traffic pinch point by the main hospital, so you'd have to budget extra time if you need to be in the center or at MONUC HQ, airport, Kibati, points north. The UN mission chief stays here, presumably because the grounds are so nice and the service is good, but he must not mind terribly sitting in fume-filled traffic every time he needs to go to work. I would.

The Ihusi is certainly posh, and some rooms, like the one I had on the top floor of the tallest building, are very nice. Others can be like caves. Overall I found the staff to be unhelpful and you needed to invest a serious amount of time if you wanted to get food. You got the sense that unless you are a local VIP or government minister, you are a secondary concern here.

VIP Palace was the opposite of this. The rooms were not very nice or clean, but the front desk couldn't have been more helpful. The wifi did not reach the room I stayed in, but I could get it in the lobby and the restaurant. You had to pay to get the password but it was on an honor system (password did not change). The business center was made available to me at no charge, even for printing. Mind you it was pretty rudimentary.

Best of all was the restaurant. Even after I moved out and down the street to the Ihusi, I walked back nearly every night for the goat brochettes and cold beer. The service was excellent as well.

If I was back in Goma, I would either stay here, or stay at Ihusi and come here for all my dining/service needs. Its about a 5 minute walk.