Since I am the first to write a review on this website for this particular hotel, I will give a broad analysis of our stay in order to give everyone a good idea of what it was like. Let me start off by saying that my husband has been a Priority Club member for quite awhile and so we typically try to stay at Holiday Inns or others from the Intercontinental Hotels Group. However, when we were planning our trip to Atlanta, we were looking for ANY hotel with: (1) a VERY low price, (2) free breakfast, (3) free parking (we had a rental car), and (4) a good location (close to the interstate and/or other destinations). We searched through just about every chain and travel website from hotels.com to Wyndham and Best Western and others. As it turned out, we chose a Holiday Inn Express after all because it just happened to meet all of the criterion. Now I will let you know how it went...

We arrived to the hotel at about noon and since check in wasn't until 3pm, our room was not ready. We were sort of expecting that so we went to the nearby Shoney's restaurant for a quick lunch and decided that we would go to the Fernbank Museum of Natural History while we waited for our room. This hotel is extremely close to I-20 which can take a person just about anywhere in the Atlanta area, which was wonderful and a large part of why we chose this hotel. When we returned after our dinner at the Olive Tree restaurant behind the hotel, we checked in and went up to room #210. When we entered, we became aware that it was an adjoining room which is something that my husband and I truly do NOT enjoy. I am unsure what the room on the other side of the adjoining door looked like or how other non-adjoined rooms looked because we did not attempt to switch. Because of this, not all rooms may be the way which I am about to describe...

THE BAD:
1. There was NO closet. Anywhere! I am a person that likes to take my clothes out of my bag and hang them so they do not wrinkle, but I was unable to do so without a closet. There is a large dresser which I laid my clothes in but most had to remain folded because of this significant drawback. Now that I have doubled checked the hotel's website, it does mention that closets are only available in "some guest rooms" which leads me to believe that only non-adjoining rooms have closets.
2. Since there was no closet, there was no ironing board and iron. The hotel website lists these items as an amenity in EVERY room and that is not the case. Once again, this may be something that is only offered in non-adjoining rooms, but I may never know.
3. There was NO alarm clock! This is somewhat of a necessity for travelers, so you can imagine my surprise when I recognized that it was missing from the room. I found myself constantly asking my husband for the time while getting ready which became quite a nuisance. We used our cell phones for alarms in the morning, but were disappointed with its absence.
4. The bathroom fan was LOUD! I mean, I know what a bathroom fan sounds like. I have heard many in my lifetime, but this one was particularly obnoxious. When I was getting ready in the morning I couldn't hear the news on the tv that was directly outside of the bathroom!!
5. There were issues with the television channels. Comcast provides all the rooms with extended cable and one HBO channel, but they would frequently timeout and say "There has been an interruption in your service." This was annoying but usually went away after a minute. Other channels like the Food Network and the Travel Channel just didn't come in properly so you could not watch them at all. Thankfully, no problems with HBO.

THE GOOD:
1. The room was VERY clean, which is something we appreciated as frequent travelers who have had some "encounters" of our own in other establishments.
2. The price is very low compared to those inside the city but is very accessible because of its close proximity to the interstate.
3. The beds were very comfortable and we particularly enjoyed the padding on the headboard so that when you sat up in the bed, you could lay against a comfortable back rather than a hard piece of wood.
4. It had a BIG mini fridge! I know that is sort of a contradiction but it was one of the largest "mini" refrigerators that I have ever seen in a hotel room.
5. The room had a large full-length mirror. I always think this is something great to have in a hotel room.
6. It is close to lots of restaurants and stores. The Olive Tree is right on the other side of the hotel's parking lot and has some pretty good Greek and Italian cuisine. They also provide room service to hotel guests between certain hours in the evening (costs a little more than eating inside). Also on the other side of the parking lot is a Shoney's. Waffle House and McDonald's are also quite close. There is even a Wal*Mart a few blocks away for those things you may have forgotten or snacks for the hotel and drinks for the big mini fridge.
7. The continental breakfast! One of the best I've had for free at any hotel. There were bagels (plain and cinnamon raisin), muffins. juices, coffee, yogurt, milk, eggs, bacon, sausage links, and... PANCAKES! Yes... pancakes. There is machine where all you do is press a button and it automatically cooks you 2 perfect and delicious pancakes. We were very impressed with it.
8. This hotel has very recently been completely renovated because it used to be a Comfort Inn. All new furniture, paint, carpets... EVERYTHING! It is also now completely non-smoking.

We saw all the main attractions during our 3 night stay and I would recommend them all and say that getting the Atlanta CityPass (http://www.citypass.com/atlanta) is certainly the way to go, especially if you have kids (we don't but we had a blast!). This Holiday Inn is called "Theme Park Area," but we stayed here and didn't even go to Six Flags! Overall, I think we would stay here again if we stayed in a different room that was non-adjoining because that would solve problems 1, 2 and 3. I only recommend this hotel to those travelling with a car because there is no airport shuttle and public transportation would probably be impossible for you to achieve. You should also print out the directions to the hotel before you get there or have a GPS. It will be very hard to find without these since it is sort of behind a main road.