Hotel Quito, Quito > Reviews > Watch your valuables!

Author's product rating:   

Value for Money	Average
Quality of Rooms	Average
Standard of Service	Good
Quality of Facilities	Good

Advantages:	Fantastic view, beautiful lobby and penthouse bar
Disadvantages:	Theft of property

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

My husband and I stayed in the Hotel Quito in October 1994 so this opinion is based on an experience 18 months ago. We stayed one night before and two nights after a trip to Galapagos and the hotel was part of a package trip we booked with Explore Worldwide (a company I recommend v. highly). As it was part of a package, I don't know what the room rate was. I'm also sorry that I can't really remember a lot of detail about the rooms - but as there hasn't been a comprehensive review of this hotel, I thought the little I could remember would be better than nothing so please be gentle when you rate me!!

On arriving at the hotel we were really surprised by the opulent lobby and the spectacular view of the valley behind. Fantastic flower displays several feet wide decorated the lobby with lots of beautiful fragrant roses - a bit of trivia for you - Ecuador is a major flower exporting country. The Hotel Quito is not part of an international hotel chain and is apparently quite a landmark in the city - best known for the views.

We'd been staying in much more down-at-heel hotels for the rest of the trip so it seemed like quite a treat. On arrival we were given cold drinks and our room keys. My husband - as he always does - tracked down the concierge to get safe-deposit facilities to put away our money/passport/tickets etc. As will become apparent later, this was wiser than he realised.

We trekked off to our room - the corridors were plush with deep carpets and the rooms had a compled double door system to keep the corridor noise to a minimum. The standard of the rooms though was definitely in the direction of 1980s Travellodge and left no real lasting impression in my mind. There was plenty of hot water and though more basic than we might have anticipated from the lobby, the rooms were clean and of a good size.

Included in the deal was a 'welcome' cocktail up in the penthouse bar with spectacular views over the city. Prices were not cheap but fair for a hotel of this standard and I really recommend visitors use the bar.

The hotel has a very attractive looking pool but we didn't use it because it was raining. We tried unsuccessfully to use the foreign exchange counter but they had no money - go figure!

During our first visit, we left very early before breakfast service started. However, the hotel did a good job of laying on a small buffet service in the mezzanine of the lobby which did the job. On our return, we had the full breakfast which had a very wide choice of food and was of pretty good quality.

OK, now onto the trouble!
We spent one night in the Hotel Quito and then packed up all our excess belongings and put them into storage. We were about to fly to Galapagos and the airlines are really strict about weight limits - and the small boat we were using had restricted space. We left one bag - locked up - in the store. On getting to Galapagos I gave my poor husband a real ear-bashing for stupidly forgetting to pack the binoculars - two pairs. I also sulked at myself for the stupidity of forgetting to bring my trainers. On returning to the hotel we found that the binoculars weren't in the bag we had left and neither were my trainers.

We are pretty nice folk and we hate to get hotel staff into trouble so when we realised that the lost items must have gone astray before we left the hotel, we reported the items to the front desk and asked them to check lost property. No joy despite repeated requests to check.

At the airport when we were leaving, we discovered that another member of our party had also lost a pair of trainers as well as an expensive pair of prescription bi-focals. In fact, the poor chap had spent a week in Galapagos unable to see anything very clearly. On the first visit, he'd been in the room adjacent to ours and it seemed that he had also been the victim of some wandering fingers. We both reported the incident to the tour company on return but with no joy.

As I said earlier, we put our valuables in the safe deposit but nothing would have prepared us for the idea that our shoes and binoculars needed to be locked up as well.

I wouldn't say don't stay here - but I would advise you not to unpack your suitcase and if you have a locakable case, leave everything that could tempt a thief, inside your case.

ADDENDUM - I just wanted to add a little note to the people who have left kind messages about the theft. It's really not such a big deal and far worse things can happen than losing a pair of shoes and some tatty old binoculars.
I wanted to tell this tale just as a bit of a cautionary one that it's never a good idea to unpack (that's my excuse, I'm sticking to it). I've been all over the world and stayed in everything from cockroach infested dives to luxury hotels and one theft is a tiny price to pay for a world of fabulous experiences.