The main disadvantage to the location of the hotel is that much of what you would want to see in Edinburgh is uphill from the hotel, so even though it is quite centrally located, going anywhere did feel like a bit of a mission to me.

Appearance

Our room, a "Standard room", was on the fifth floor, with a view of the street outside and a building site. Decor wise it is typical quality-but-not-boutique hotel. I reckon it would have last been refurbed in the 1990s. The bed was large and took up a lot of the room. The room was equipped with a flat-screen TV which showed Freeview and some European channels. It was equipped with a ceiling fan and in the style of a nosey mother-in-law I stood on the bed and checked the top of the fan for dust. There wasn't any.

The facilities in the room were a hairdryer, an iron and fold-out ironing board, safe and the usual tea and coffee making kit, with shortbread biscuits.

The breakfast is a buffet. We went down at 0930, half an hour before the end of breakfast time. There was a table with an assortment of cereals, a continental breakfast buffet and a fried breakfast buffet, pastries and fruit juices. As were getting fed before a long train journey, I decided to have a huge breakfast. I couldn't see any yoghurts, which was a bit disappointing as I like a yoghurt in the morning and it was listed on the menu. The staff were busying about and I didn't want to bother them, so there may well have been yoghurt I just missed in my bleary-eyed state.

From the fried breakfast bar I took a sausage, a fried egg, a fried potato scone and a hash brown. The sausage was okay, but the fried egg was undercooked to my taste, with lots of runny white and yolk. Everything was quite greasy.

Thistle hotels always feel like upmarket Travelodge type accomodation to me. I have stayed in others and the chain is pretty consistent. There was nothing wrong with the accomodation, but it lacked the attention to detail you would get in a "proper posh hotel". I know there were posher rooms available, but it was things like the breakfast and the heating system that jarred me and these things would have been the same regardless of the class of room.

I don't know if I would recommend the hotel for potential guests. It seems to me you should either save the money and stay in a Travelodge type hotel, or pay the extra and go all out for luxury in one of the old hotels in Edinburgh. But it wasn't horrible. As a base for explorations it was perfectly fine. But still.... I dunno. We plan to go back to Edinburgh, and will probably stay elsewhere.