Tuesday, December 06, 2005

The Grand Hotel In Saigon

Grand Hotel
Grand Hotel in Saigon
Originally uploaded by yellojkt.
Our headquarters while in Saigon was the Grand Hotel, which is a government-run colonial-era hotel on Dong Khoi near the Saigon river. The colonial portion of the hotel is three stories tall with large grand open rooms. A more modern addition is ten stories tall and has more standard sized hotel rooms.

Despite it's name, the Grand Hotel is not the grandest hotel in Saigon. The Caravelle is the premiere colonial era hotel in the area. Several international chains have built modern contemporary luxury high-rises in the area as well, including Sheraton, Sofitel, and Rennaissance. Rooms in these more luxurious hotels can be US$200 or more a night. Another large luxury hotel was about open while we were there in July.

Grand Hotel Lobby
Grand Hotel Lobby
Originally uploaded by yellojkt.
The Grand Hotel had an excellent buffet breakfast with a great variety of fresh fruit and fruit juices each morning as well as the typical pho/omlette choice.

The location is also very nice being on the quieter end of Dong Khoi, which is the main shopping district for luxury goods. A wide variety of western and traditional restaurants were just blocks away.

The hotel itself had a very small lap pool with some token exercise machines in the corner of the outside pool patio serving as the "fitness center". A spa in the hotel offered a wide range of massages and manicures at prices competitive the salons all up and down Dong Khoi.

Overall, the hotel was very nice, but the general inexpensiveness of the hotels in the area would make us want to try one of the even more luxurious ones nearby if we visited again.

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