I stayed here with my son for a swim meet in July. We had a group rate of $109 but the desk clerk was having trouble with her computer and couldn't check us in right away. It was only about 10 minutes, but she compensated me for my time by knocking my rate down to $89/nt. I thought that went above and beyond. The room was very nice and clean. The beds were queen-sized and not full which was a plus. The bathroom was plenty large and the vanity had shelves under it for storage of toiletries. The A/C worked well - it had a digital display which allowed you to program in the temperature you wanted. Breakfast was adequate at best. I was not impressed however, it was free. The breakfast/lounge area had lots of seating and 2 flat screen tvs. It was a nice place to gather in the evening with a group for food, games, whatever. The Beefstro restaurant is attached and it is convenient and pretty good. The location of this hotel is convenient for getting on I80 and reaching the University of Iowa. It is close to restaurants and gas stations.

The staff was friendly and helpful.
The quesadilla appetizers are absolutely the BEST. We stayed there for five days and gave up trying to find anything better than the hotel restaurant.

It seems this hotel is hit or miss. I've stayed several times in the past due to the convenient location and excellent breakfast. The quality of service from front desk personnel is extremely variable as is that from housekeeping. I've received exemplary service from friendly employees but have also come across unhelpful and rather passive employees on other occasions. This theme is consistent with the cleanliness and completeness with regard to stock after housekeeping service each day. Some of my stays seemed to have been hosted by housekeepers with zeal for their work while others had the lackadaisical feel of a lazy employee. I've had the best luck on the 2nd floor with regard to housekeeping.

As far as "peace and quiet" goes, the hotel is again hit or miss. The odd-numbered rooms face the interstate which creates noticeable noise issues on occasion (semi passage is a common occurrence on I-80) but the even-numbered rooms rarely had issues. As with any hotel, quietness of your room largely depends on the fellow guests on a given night. Being located in a "college town," it is a common occurrence for this hotel to be populated with athletic teams of various sorts. Again, hit or miss with the ages and behavior of other guests. It wouldn't be a bad idea to call ahead when considering a reservation at this property to assess the possibility of encountering a rowdy group. As a general hotel rule, the less people above you, the quieter the room, but this is not always the case.

Again, due to this being a town with a Big 10 University, football game weekends and graduation weekends are nigh impossible to book. If you're successful in getting a room at all, expect to pay extremely high rates with a 2 night minimum (Friday and Saturday). The second weekend in May is U of I graduation and football games are sporadically placed on the weekends from early September to late October (generally).

The property is rather old but has received all the necessary upgrades (flat screens, carpet, etc.). The lobby is nice, the pool is average (it's shared between two hotels) and has the added bonus of a pretty good restaurant (also shared, however). The breakfast is definitely the strongest feature of this hotel. The breakfast attendants put forth excellent effort and display a genuine desire to please their customers. The food served is up to normal Hampton standards and they even set out some local extras (which is against Hampton rules I think :P).

The inconsistencies with this property most likely stem from budget constraints by management. Their heating/air units seem inconsistent and I've seen 2-3 different methods of control. All have panels on the unit but some can only be controlled by thermostats on the wall. During one of my stays I encountered a unit that had the thermostat, but due to a maintenance issue, had to be controlled via the panel on the unit. This was odd and slightly confusing but not overly inconvenient.

Consistent with the hit or miss theme, areas in some rooms show signs of wear. I've noticed wallpaper tears, outlet issues and some tile issues. The new carpeting that was installed last year ( I believe it was last year) was a needed upgrade as were the new curtains and linens. Towels are hit or miss. Some are rather threadbare and faded while others are spotless and fluffy.

The wireless internet is also hit or miss. On busy nights, this property's allotted bandwidth can't handle the excessive load of users. Quiet nights, however, provide no inconvenience. The business center needs work. Two computers are set up but are clearly not maintained. They operate slowly and have inconsistent connections to the hotel's wireless. The printer works fine, however, as long as you are able to navigate to whatever you intend to print.

Try to avoid handicap-accessible rooms if you do not require their modifications. The wardrobe is awkwardly short and for reasons unknown to this reviewer the sinks drain slower. This sink issue was confirmed by the front desk however no one I talked to had an explanation for why this was so. (Note from a frequent guest: rooms 300 and 302 are not denoted as handicap-accessible for this property but they are in actuality h-a).

The cost of a room at this hotel is higher than expected. This is rather consistent with the Iowa City/Coralville area, however; it is certainly not unique to this property. That said, however, I do not consider the rack rate at this hotel representative of the quality received. THAT said, however, ask for a discount! Depending on your luck with front desk staff, some are more than willing to knock the rate down a little bit if you just ask. Again, hit or miss.

The layout of this complex can be rather confusing, however the "Hampton side" is simple. The complex consists of two hotels (the Hampton and a full service Holiday Inn) and the restaurant. All of the Hampton's four room-halls are located atop one another in the same area, leaving little room to get disoriented. If you find yourself in other areas of the building, however, keep track of how you arrived there.

This property has finally begun to show signs of age in the last 5-6 years but continual upgrades do their best to keep this hotel afloat. A "hit" can be a 5-star experience while a "miss" can get down into the 1-2 star range.

A note for those unfamiliar with the "Hampton experience." The Hampton is a branch hotel of Hilton. Its features are designed to cater foremost to the business traveler and secondarily to families. This is most noticeable in the size of the rooms. To say they're small wouldn't be accurate. Rather, consider them cozy and comfortable. Their beds are some of the most comfortable in the industry as are their pillows (this property meets expectations in this regard). 99% of Hamptons do not have a restaurant (this property only does due to it being a requirement of the full service Holiday Inn in the same building). Hampton Inn hotels are generally a very good experience.

Hopefully, this review was helpful.

We stayed here for 1 night while visiting our daughter who is a college student in Cedar Rapids. Usually we stay in CR, but our hotel choices there were booked this time. I would say that this hotel is dated. Our room was on the first floor which is really the basement of the hotel. We were right next to the laundry room and housekeeping/ maintenance areas. The doors to these areas were open every time we passed them and most of the time unattended. I wondered about safety issues as there seemed to be several groups of children who were not being supervised wandering around and making a lot of noise.

The room itself, while very dated, was very clean and the bed was very comfortable. This would be acceptable if the price of the hotel was reasonable. We definitely paid for more than we received here.

The icing on the cake for us was the housekeeper knocking on the door and barging in the room within seconds to clean our room when it was only 10:30 am on a Sunday, and we had NOT checked out yet. I believe most hotels notify their staff when rooms are ready to be cleaned.

If you are looking for a basic clean hotel room this is for you, but you will pay more than you would expect to pay for this.