It's 3:45AM and I'm standing in the lobby of the Grand Hotel in my pajamas. This detour from my planned night of sleep is due to what was quite literally the loudest fan I have ever heard in any room, of any hotel, in my life.
I was in room 402, which is on the top floor and near the end of the hallway, so I don't know if that had something to do with it (maybe the equipment was right above me), but even the night attendant that came up to my room acknowledged that he could hear the noise from outside in the hallway.
Want to hear it yourself? I recorded it with my phone and put it online here:
http://www.box.net/shared/6109q7acat
While the front desk attendant was sympathetic, he said that there was nothing they could do since the hotel was booked solid, a statement that surprised me since the parking lot was empty and the lobby had no traffic whatsoever the evening I checked in, the next morning, or even throughout the day. (I did not leave the hotel during the day.) I'm not necessarily saying the hotel wasn't full, I'm just stating what I observed.
They did move me the next day to a room on the first floor, and while not as noisy, the fan was still remarkably loud. The rooms themselves are very odd. They are oversized, but sparsely furnished. There are flat screen TVs, but no hi-def channels, so every channel looks like crap. The pillows are very uncomfortable. There's no wifi (really, in the middle of Silicon Valley, no wifi???) and the food was on the comes-up-short side of mediocre.
Yea, I pretty much hated this hotel and would advise anyone to stay away from it. Next time I come to town I'll be staying at the Hilton Garden Inn, one mile down the road.
- Grand Hotel Sunnyvale
