Grand View Garden Hotel, Beijing

I stayed here in june and was a real pleasure to stay. The rooms are lovely and clean and well furnished, on arrival our standard rooms were not ready for us so they put us in executive which was good of them.
A porter took our bags to our room for us which was nice, in our executive room we had a kettle but in the stanard you are only provided with a hot flask of water in the morning to make your teas with but by evening its gone cold.
The beds were big with two pillows, and large bedside tables and lamps. There was a mini fridge, hot water flask, jamine tea sachets, glasses, air con, television, desk, plug sockets, large bathroom with toilet, shower and sink, mirror. Towels were provided everyday and beds made up for you. They also replenished the soaps/toilet paper for you.

Inside the hotel there is several restuarants but were expensive compared to the local restaurants down the road. There was a bar, bowling alley and small gym but we never used them whilst we stayed. I did use the internet to email home. Small smart office where you get your own private area with computer, printer, scanners etc. but it was expensive to use! cost me about £4 for 20-25minutes but never spotted a internet cafe while we were there to use.

We paid for breakfast upfront when we booked the hoilday and is well worth it! it was continental style food with a chef that would cook you either fried or omellette eggs whilst you wait! There was toast, waffles, pancakes, ceral, fresh fruit, jams, bread, cheese and cakes. There was also a selection of hot foods including bacon, ham, eggy bread, potato cubes, boiled eggs, baked beans, noodles, rice, stir fried vegetables. Chinese tea, coffee, apple, orange juice and water to!
So you could really stock up as it was all you can eat and head out with a full belly to keep you going all day.

When you leave the hotel there is a car bay where taxis and bus pull up on. If you stand out there some of the staff will call a taxi cab over for you to take you where ever you wanted. The heart of Beijing (Tian Square) was a short 5minute taxi ride and cost no more than £2 for 4 of us!!

When we came home from our day out instead of eat in the hotel we walked 10 minutes up the street to the local restuarants. The hotel food was the same price as you would expect over here in a posh restaurant, and we also felt it wouldnt be such a good experience if we ate their instead of local places.

Every meal we had out was AMAZING and so cheap! a meal for four including drinks never came to more than £15. One night we went out and turned left from the hotel until we found a large restaurant, dont know the name of it, not sure if it even had one really but it was long and had huge red lateens hanging outside. As soon as we stepped in the door and asked 'do you have english menu' they ushered us all upstairs into a private room! I felt like royalty, it was a bit strange to start with but you soon come to realise that the chinese really like english people and look at us as being really wealthy. They were so sweet and polite and waited on us all night, constantly checking on us to make sure our drinks were full and we were eating, and it was beautiful! One word of advice - when you order a dish dont expect it to be a small one person dish because there not they are huge! You only need order about 3 main dishes and 1/2 rice between four that is.

Anyway back to the hotel, it is named the grand view gardens because out the back is a huge garden which was infact used for a television show in china! It is free for those who stay in the hotel but if your not staying in there you have to pay. We spent a good couple of hours walking round it all. there is a huge man made lake in the middle with lots of trees and little chinese buildings and ornaments around. There is also a small animal 'zoo' which was quite nice. Peacocks, rabbits, guinea pigs, deers, goats, monkeys etc. It was quite sad though because all the animals were so hungry and the staff sell food to visitors so you can feed them - so we did - and most of it! it was gone in a few seconds. Definalty worth visiting the gardens as they area beautiful, and in the evening there are shows. We didnt stay in the evening so never got to see any, but during the day there are entertainers and people dressed up in lovely costumes.

This hotel is not slap bag in the heart but a few minutes in a taxi so at night if you walk along the streets you really experience chinese street life. It is wonderful. There is a local supermarket about 15minutes up the right hand road which was good to go in and bring back some chinese biscuits and chinese versions of cadburys chocolate! :-) and we also found a small bar 5 minutes down the road to stop and have a chinese beer at outiside.