Husa Moncloa Hotel

...two of us into the Husa Moncloa for 4 nights, which had, in addition to a pool, a good looking location and 4 shiny stars to boot.

We arrived by plane and took the Metro to the hotel. This took about 45 minutes, involved one change of line, and cost €1 each. Bargain. For those who prefer to travel in style, a taxi would cost you about €25. Though there's also an airport-city shuttle bus, this stops miles from the hotel, so isn't that ...
...to facilities which, on paper at least, are semi-decent. I wouldn't stay there again, but equally I don't regret staying there this one time. Perfectly acceptable, just nothing special.

Husa Moncloa
Serrano Jover 1
Madrid
28015

http://www.hotelhusamoncloa.com/index0.htm
  ... more

We went to Madrid for a mothers' day treat which meant the mother in the party got to dictate the hotel we stayed at. She wanted somewhere with a pool. Madrid, it turns out, doesn't have that many hotels with indoor pools, and being March, we didn't want to splash around outside. So, I booked the two of us into the Husa Moncloa for 4 nights, which had, in addition to a pool, a good looking location and 4 shiny stars to boot.

We arrived by plane and took the Metro to the hotel. This took about 45 minutes, involved one change of line, and cost €1 each. Bargain. For those who prefer to travel in style, a taxi would cost you about €25. Though there's also an airport-city shuttle bus, this stops miles from the hotel, so isn't that convenient. For getting around, the hotel is well situated a mere 50m from a metro stop (Arguelles) served by 3 different lines. Madrid, however, is not really all that big and most days we just ambled around on foot, sometimes metro-ing back if we got especially tired. The Palacio Real, the huge Parque del Oeste (complete with the Templo de Debod) and the Plaza de España are all really near by, and the road the hotel is just off, Calle de la Princesa, is home to a ton of shops including a gigantic El Corte Inglés with a brilliant food hall, where we often got picnic food from.

When we arrived, check in was easy as we were the only people hassling the 2 reception staff at that time. We got a garbled message about breakfast times and our key, but no other hotel information as such, nor a city map. Our room was on the 3rd floor of a building with maybe 10 floors, thus handy for us as, when without luggage, we could easily sprint up and down the marblesque staircases.

Our room was reasonably large, but unfortunately smelt rather smoky. We weren't asked at check in whether we wanted smoking or smoke-free, so I could only assume I must have inadvertently booked this room type, perhaps because the cheapy website I used didn't offer a choice. Still, when we flicked on the air con, the smell dissipated, and for the rest of our stay we didn't really notice it.

The room had two largish single beds with the most amazing, soft mattresses ever, though ruined by a weird mess of sheets and blankets that I had to kick my way around each night. The view was of the street below, but we had thick gazed windows so didn't hear much. There were two comfy chairs and a small coffee table, and huge wardrobes and a desk, so plenty of room to spread out in. The TV had a dodgy selection of channels (BBC World and CNN in English, Pro7 in German and some Spanish things, but no music video channel, nor radio stations) but at least the reception was good. It sat on our minibar but being a swish hotel this was one of those horrible new fangled ones that notice when you move anything in or out of it, so we couldn't shift out the biers and overpriced Kit Kats (€3!) to accommodate my water bottle or tub of moisturizer as I would have liked.

The bathroom was large too, and had a bidet (!), two sinks (though only one plug), a beautifully powerful shower and a toilet, neatly hidden behind a privacy screen. Only thing was, there was a full length mirror on the back of the door and the angle meant you could see from the shower straight behind the mini-wall and into the loo, so it was all a bit pointless. The shower and sinks were fitted with general shower gel and soap dispensers but, in a nod to those of us who love hotel toiletries, they still provided a selection of perhaps slightly-un-orthodox freebies: a comb, a box of tissues etc. The bathroom had just enough fluffy, fresh towels, but not really enough room to hang up all the wet ones a once. We were asked not to use room towels for the gym / pool, and a special one was provided in our room for use in these areas, but having one between the two of us seemed a bit odd.

We did go to the pool/gym though, and soon realised the towel situation was the least of the peculiarities. Firstly, you had to find the way in. Our hotel was attached to a 5* place, the Princesa, and the gym was accessible through there. We took the lift to the basement and followed the sign but ended up opening a sort of secret door into the gym and nearly beheading a few gym-goers in the process as the door was right next to the mats and people were lying on them, crunching away. Later we found the main entrance, out on the street and round the corner, as this gym was a proper one with public access, and seemed to be a pretty happening place. Or, in other words, it was manically crowded. It was well equipped though, and had a fab array of classes in the 3 studios. The pool, however, was another matter. It was located right in the middle of the gym, with 3 glass walls, overlooked by treadmills, meaning people running away for hours on end, with nowhere else to look, ended up looking at you splashing up and down. Very odd, and not at all relaxing. You have to wear swimming caps in the pool (available free from the Princesa's reception if you happen to know the term gorro de baño, or are good at miming. The other thing worthy of note is that the lockers in the changing rooms are on a BYO padlock basis, and being on a classy hotel trip rather than a trashy hostel one, I didn't have one with me. The reception couldn't lend us one, but did offer to keep hold of wallets and room keys while we worked out.

Breakfast is one of my favourite reasons for going on holiday, and to a certain extent does dictate the hotel I book. This one looked good on the first day, was a bit boring by day 2 and, by day 3, I was smuggling in a few supplementary items in my handbag - orange juice cartons and Nutella - to spice things up a bit. The spread, which did not alter at all from day to day included:

- Plain rolls, bread and toast
- Greasy croissants, nice chocolate things and fruity pastries
- Dubious butter and honey, and some jams
- Peculiar hard cheese slices and meat, which may have been ok, though we didn't try it.
- Some dry, non-name-brand cereals
- Some bruised fruit and yoghurts
- A range of hot things like anaemic looking baked beans and smelly eggs (that's not an indication of the quality….I think all eggs are smelly)
- Churros - the highlight for me - i.e. stringy, crisp Spanish donut things you dip in hot chocolate
- Tea and coffee, fine, and fruit juices, not. I'm not sure what these were, but they weren't drinkable in my book (too much sugar, not enough fruit, far to psychedelic in colour) so I stuck to water until the above smuggling incidents began.

It just got a bit old after a few days, especially since, being vegetarians, our choices were limited to about half of what was put out. You couldn't starve on a buffet like that but equally our plans of spending hours there, planning our days and relaxing over a nice drink, soon went out of the window and we spent no more than 20 minutes there each morning. This wasn't helped by the huge crowds at certain times, and the odd seating arrangements - lots of tables for 4 even though lots of people were business travellers, dining solo.

Our hotel didn't have any other facilities, but the Princesa next door had bars and restaurants, though these were neither cheap nor inspiring when we went for a nosy. I'm surprised our hotel got 4 stars with nothing else to offer, but it was still a nice place to stay. Nothing fancy, and with a breakfast that could be better, but the rooms were nice and the location perfect for us. We paid about £290 for 4 nights, or about £72 per night for the two of us, which is more than travel lodge prices but not that bad for a capital city an access to facilities which, on paper at least, are semi-decent. I wouldn't stay there again, but equally I don't regret staying there this one time. Perfectly acceptable, just nothing special.

Husa Moncloa
Serrano Jover 1
Madrid
28015

http://www.hotelhusamoncloa.com/index0.htm
 

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