michelleh1
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2009
- Messages
- 285
here's my review of Desert Inn and Suites. We stayed in a C-1 suite (which holds up to 8 guests) for 6 nights.
We chose this hotel for the following reasons:
1 - location
2 - size of room and number of bathrooms
3 - price
The DI&S is an older hotel. Like other reviews have stated - it's pretty basic but clean.
I almost didn't take pictures because the rooms look just like they have pictured on the website. The furniture, beds and bedding are nice. The rooms were spacious and there was plenty of room for our family of 6. The beds are on the firmer side but very comfortable! I slept better on their beds than on the pillow-top beds we had for our travel hotel.
The linens were clean and smelled of bleach (towels and sheets). We came back to the hotel twice before housekeeping got to our room. They still came though and we just had them empty the garbages and give us clean towels. There were plenty of towels for us. They gave us 8 of each (bath, hand and washcloth) each day.
Our room included 1 sitting area, 2 bedrooms and 1-1/2 baths. Each room had 2 queen sized beds, a night stand table in-between the beds and a chest of drawers (3 drawers) with a t.v. on top. Each room has it's own heater/air conditioner and temperature control. The main room had a stand that held the mini-fridge and microwave. The main room had a 1/2 bath in it - so just the vanity and a toilet. The second room included a desk with a chair, and a small table with 2 chairs. I would've preferred that the desk be in the main room and the fridge/microwave in the same room with the table, but it wasn't a big deal. The 2nd room had a full bath with a tub/shower combo. Both rooms had the vanity separate from the bathroom which was nice.
We did not use the breakfast or the swimming pool. I did peek in at the pool as we walked by, but I never entered the room (it's an indoor pool). It looked clean from a distance and there were always people inside swimming. Our hotel information sheet stated that breakfast is from 7:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m.
They had 3 ice machines for the property and we were able to get ice each morning. One of the machines wasn't working on one of the mornings, but we went to another one and had no problems.
I did use the guest laundry that is on-site. It was $1.75 to wash and $1.75 to dry. They had 4 washers (but one was out-of-order) and 4 dryers. It took about 1 hour and 15 minutes to completely wash and dry a load of laundry. I did a batch of colors and they dried well in the dryer. Several others were also doing laundry at the same time as me. All of their clothes dried well too, except for a batch of darks that were still slightly damp.
The location was great! It was so nice to be able to walk to and from DLR so quickly. I wouldn't want to walk any further at the end of the night.
We were on the 2nd floor and our biggest complaint was noise. We heard noise from the parking lot (guests coming and going, garbage truck at 5 a.m. and 7 a.m. on different days). We also heard the people directly above us - we could hear them walking around was all. And we heard the water running when the people next to us were using the bathroom. My kids were in the 2nd room, right next door to where a group of teens were staying part of the time. They said that they could hear them and they kept them up at night.
However, when I talked to others who were doing laundry, they didn't have the noise issues we did. One was staying in a Parlor A suite on the 4th floor, and the other was in a C-2 suite on the 3rd floor. Perhaps because they were further up they didn't hear the parking lot noise like we did. Perhaps because the teens were right next door to us and not them they didn't hear them. Also, if you look at the floorplans, the Parlor A suite and the C-2 suite both have separate living rooms that can be closed off by a door. I think that helped to keep their rooms quieter for them.
We would stay here again.
Now for the pics:
here's the floorplan of the room we stayed in
here's the website picture of the beds. I didn't get one with the beds made. the bedspread was nice. the back of it was soft like suede/microfiber. the carpet was decent.
this is the sitting area, which is in what I call the main room. just a small couch and table. the couch does not have a sofabed, although some of the suites do include one, the C-1 does not.
this is the mini-fridge and microwave. the microwave is on the small side, but it held our paper plates and cups just fine. the microwave is older and it took longer than usual to heat stuff, but it did work. it also had a dial instead of a touch-pad, so it was hard to tell just how long things were in. I loved having the shelf above the microwave for storage. We kept all of our snacks on it. We brought most of our food with us because of food allergies. The fridge held everything I brought from our cooler, and we kept our milk in the cooler with ice.
this is the 1/2 bath vanity area. it's smaller than the one in the full bath. this one had the coffee maker which we didn't use.
here's the storage area, that's right next to the vanity.
and here's the toilet area in the 1/2 bath. there was a spot where you could tell they took down some type of rod and didn't patch it, but it really wasn't a big deal to us.
this is all in the 2nd room, just to give you an idea of the layout.
here's the desk area in the 2nd room.
here's the small table and chairs.
and the vanity for the full-bath. this one had the hair dryer which did not work in our room.
the storage area for the full-bath. I did not use the iron so I'm not sure how well it worked.
and the toilet/bath area. the shower head was old, but it worked. the water pressure was great, almost too strong after we had been there a few days and had sun-burned scalps. We had plenty of hot water on the days we showered before 7. On the days we showered at 7:30, the water was warm, but not hot. It was warm enough for a shower though.
I would be glad to answer any questions that I can - just let me know if you have any.
We chose this hotel for the following reasons:
1 - location
2 - size of room and number of bathrooms
3 - price
The DI&S is an older hotel. Like other reviews have stated - it's pretty basic but clean.
I almost didn't take pictures because the rooms look just like they have pictured on the website. The furniture, beds and bedding are nice. The rooms were spacious and there was plenty of room for our family of 6. The beds are on the firmer side but very comfortable! I slept better on their beds than on the pillow-top beds we had for our travel hotel.
The linens were clean and smelled of bleach (towels and sheets). We came back to the hotel twice before housekeeping got to our room. They still came though and we just had them empty the garbages and give us clean towels. There were plenty of towels for us. They gave us 8 of each (bath, hand and washcloth) each day.
Our room included 1 sitting area, 2 bedrooms and 1-1/2 baths. Each room had 2 queen sized beds, a night stand table in-between the beds and a chest of drawers (3 drawers) with a t.v. on top. Each room has it's own heater/air conditioner and temperature control. The main room had a stand that held the mini-fridge and microwave. The main room had a 1/2 bath in it - so just the vanity and a toilet. The second room included a desk with a chair, and a small table with 2 chairs. I would've preferred that the desk be in the main room and the fridge/microwave in the same room with the table, but it wasn't a big deal. The 2nd room had a full bath with a tub/shower combo. Both rooms had the vanity separate from the bathroom which was nice.
We did not use the breakfast or the swimming pool. I did peek in at the pool as we walked by, but I never entered the room (it's an indoor pool). It looked clean from a distance and there were always people inside swimming. Our hotel information sheet stated that breakfast is from 7:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m.
They had 3 ice machines for the property and we were able to get ice each morning. One of the machines wasn't working on one of the mornings, but we went to another one and had no problems.
I did use the guest laundry that is on-site. It was $1.75 to wash and $1.75 to dry. They had 4 washers (but one was out-of-order) and 4 dryers. It took about 1 hour and 15 minutes to completely wash and dry a load of laundry. I did a batch of colors and they dried well in the dryer. Several others were also doing laundry at the same time as me. All of their clothes dried well too, except for a batch of darks that were still slightly damp.
The location was great! It was so nice to be able to walk to and from DLR so quickly. I wouldn't want to walk any further at the end of the night.
We were on the 2nd floor and our biggest complaint was noise. We heard noise from the parking lot (guests coming and going, garbage truck at 5 a.m. and 7 a.m. on different days). We also heard the people directly above us - we could hear them walking around was all. And we heard the water running when the people next to us were using the bathroom. My kids were in the 2nd room, right next door to where a group of teens were staying part of the time. They said that they could hear them and they kept them up at night.
However, when I talked to others who were doing laundry, they didn't have the noise issues we did. One was staying in a Parlor A suite on the 4th floor, and the other was in a C-2 suite on the 3rd floor. Perhaps because they were further up they didn't hear the parking lot noise like we did. Perhaps because the teens were right next door to us and not them they didn't hear them. Also, if you look at the floorplans, the Parlor A suite and the C-2 suite both have separate living rooms that can be closed off by a door. I think that helped to keep their rooms quieter for them.
We would stay here again.
Now for the pics:
here's the floorplan of the room we stayed in
here's the website picture of the beds. I didn't get one with the beds made. the bedspread was nice. the back of it was soft like suede/microfiber. the carpet was decent.
this is the sitting area, which is in what I call the main room. just a small couch and table. the couch does not have a sofabed, although some of the suites do include one, the C-1 does not.
this is the mini-fridge and microwave. the microwave is on the small side, but it held our paper plates and cups just fine. the microwave is older and it took longer than usual to heat stuff, but it did work. it also had a dial instead of a touch-pad, so it was hard to tell just how long things were in. I loved having the shelf above the microwave for storage. We kept all of our snacks on it. We brought most of our food with us because of food allergies. The fridge held everything I brought from our cooler, and we kept our milk in the cooler with ice.
this is the 1/2 bath vanity area. it's smaller than the one in the full bath. this one had the coffee maker which we didn't use.
here's the storage area, that's right next to the vanity.
and here's the toilet area in the 1/2 bath. there was a spot where you could tell they took down some type of rod and didn't patch it, but it really wasn't a big deal to us.
this is all in the 2nd room, just to give you an idea of the layout.
here's the desk area in the 2nd room.
here's the small table and chairs.
and the vanity for the full-bath. this one had the hair dryer which did not work in our room.
the storage area for the full-bath. I did not use the iron so I'm not sure how well it worked.
and the toilet/bath area. the shower head was old, but it worked. the water pressure was great, almost too strong after we had been there a few days and had sun-burned scalps. We had plenty of hot water on the days we showered before 7. On the days we showered at 7:30, the water was warm, but not hot. It was warm enough for a shower though.
I would be glad to answer any questions that I can - just let me know if you have any.
.
We also had a room with a whirlpool tub and I noticed a very long black hair stuck in the silver metal emergency drain. None of us have black hair. It stayed there the entire time we were there. 
