Hilton Clearwater Beach Hotel
- Thread starter kellyglv
- Start date
Miffy2003
<font color=orange>I've got Saratoga Springs - mak
- Joined
- Aug 13, 2003
- Messages
- 12,175
We have not stayed here before but stayed right next door to it in 2002. It looked nice and I can confirm that the location is fab. Right on the beach, with quite a few restaurants within easy walking distance. Garage opposite for gas and sundries, and also an off licence.
The hotel bar looked nice at the Hilton, but the hotel we were at was also nice so we didn't venture over.
The hotel bar looked nice at the Hilton, but the hotel we were at was also nice so we didn't venture over.
Hi Miffy2003, sorry to be a little off topic but which hotel did you stay in?
I am going in a couple of weks and staying at The Best Western Sea Wake Beach Resort but have just found out that it is being knocked down originally in March but apparantly now by July so I am starting to worry about going now.
I am going in a couple of weks and staying at The Best Western Sea Wake Beach Resort but have just found out that it is being knocked down originally in March but apparantly now by July so I am starting to worry about going now.
Miffy2003
<font color=orange>I've got Saratoga Springs - mak
- Joined
- Aug 13, 2003
- Messages
- 12,175
We stayed here Neil:
Quality Inn on the Beach
The reason we chose it was because it was the cheapest hotel in the Virgin brochure then (in Clearwater Beach). We were really delighted by this hotel for the price we paid for it (we had sprung for an extra £7 a night for an oceanfront room and it was worth every single penny)
Quality Inn on the Beach
The reason we chose it was because it was the cheapest hotel in the Virgin brochure then (in Clearwater Beach). We were really delighted by this hotel for the price we paid for it (we had sprung for an extra £7 a night for an oceanfront room and it was worth every single penny)
susieh
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Aug 3, 2005
- Messages
- 462
We stayed at the Hilton Clearwater for a week in July 2000. The hotel was nice and clean and we had a room with a balcony overlooking the Gulf. You could walk straight out of the hotel onto the beach and down to the sea.
The hotel pool was also good. We had a car but we didnt use it except when we went exploring the area.
Over the street from the hotel is a marina, we went on skidoos from here one day (be warned though, most travel insurances dont cover this), and on one day I went out on a schooner for 5 hours which I really enjoyed.
We also went parasailing from the beach.
The first night we were there we walked along the beach in the twilight and about 100yds out at sea was a dolphin just keeping pace with us, we could watch his dorsal fin appear and disappear as we walked along. It was magical and really made a lovely start to the trip.
Our sons were 16 and 18 so we didnt use the kids clubs at the hotel so sorry can't help there
The hotel pool was also good. We had a car but we didnt use it except when we went exploring the area.
Over the street from the hotel is a marina, we went on skidoos from here one day (be warned though, most travel insurances dont cover this), and on one day I went out on a schooner for 5 hours which I really enjoyed.
We also went parasailing from the beach.
The first night we were there we walked along the beach in the twilight and about 100yds out at sea was a dolphin just keeping pace with us, we could watch his dorsal fin appear and disappear as we walked along. It was magical and really made a lovely start to the trip.
Our sons were 16 and 18 so we didnt use the kids clubs at the hotel so sorry can't help there
Hi I stayed here a few years ago for 2 nights. Clear water was lovely and a refreshing change from Orlando. The hotel was in a great location and our balcony had a wonderful view showing the beach. The rooms were clean but the a/c was extremely loud that we had to sleep with it off which was uncomfortable as we went in April. We did not have breakfast included so never sampled their food although im sure it would be lovely as Hilton standards are always high. The pool was nice even if you did have to fight for a lounger!
ThumperThistle
Flower of Scotland
- Joined
- Apr 28, 2001
- Messages
- 201
I stayed at Clearwater Hilton July2005 for 7 nights. I will never return to this hotel after my experience. I have copied part of our trip report about our arrival,
Disney Delights and Hilton Horrors Tour: Day 14 (Move to the Hilton)
Day 14: July 14th
At 4pm our fun really began. Woman who checked us in and then tried to charge us again when we enquired about the room being ready allocates us Room 406 and says she will call Bells Service to have the luggage brought up. Up in the lift we go and the first thing I notice when we step out the lift is how hot the corridor is (turns out the corridors are not air conditioned). Find the room and the card wont open the door, tried various times and it still wouldnt work so we asked the housekeeping lady if we were doing it properly. She explains that sometimes the cards can be sticky and that prevents it from opening. She opens the door with her card and we discover the room is already occupied!!!
Back to front desk. There is a big line and this point. Tricia walks to the front and tells woman what has happened. She is full of apologies and blames housekeeping for passing on the wrong information. She gives us another room and says she will give us vouchers for free breakfasts for the length of our stay. Head off again to room 315. When you book this hotel with Virgin the brochure states you will have a preferred South view and the room will have a balcony. As we were walking down the hot corridor we knew the room was on the wrong side and it was not going to be a South view but we decide to look and if it was nice we just take it. Into room and the curtains were shut. Opened the curtains to see what the view from the balcony was like only to discover the balcony was in fact a wall, we didnt have one and we only had a tiny little window that looked into the air conditioning units for the hotel. Tricia now looks ready to blow a gasket. She went back down to front desk and I stayed in the room because Bells Service were on there way with the luggage. She got the same woman and was told the hotel was full and there were no other rooms, Tricia told her that was fine she would go round to the Virgin office and they could sort it and a room remarkably appeared on the system. Lovely man from Bells Service arrives with the luggage and I explain what was happening. He phones front desk and tells me Tricia is on her way back and that we are going to room 854. He says this is a harbour view and asks if I want to accept it. I tell him we will go and see it. When Tricia arrives we all go to room 854. On the way nice man tells us that front desk are incompetent and they dont even know the layout of the hotel or where any of the rooms are. He says room 406 and room 315 are not even the same price!!! We find room 854 has been refurbished but while the harbour view is lovely when you look off to the right when you look straight ahead you are looking at the roofs of the shops opposite and there is a busy road underneath. We tell nice man we are not staying here. He phones front desk and tells the manager our story. Tricia then goes on the phone and manager asks how she is. She tells him angry and getting angrier by the minute, he doesnt speak for a few minutes and then says he will come up. I have to add that when she told him she was getting angrier nice Bells Service man laughs.
Ten minutes later there is a chap on the door. Bells Service man opens it and in walks the popcorn man!!! His first words are, HEY! Are you happy? He gets the Virgin brochure fired at him to show him what we have paid for and what we want. He tells us how the hotel is full but he has a special room he thinks will make us happy, he keeps this room incase emergencies like this pop up or he has to stay the night. Off we trot to room 917 with popcorn man who has now been renamed Mr Brittas (his real name is Zeljko Nikic). He was so like him in mannerisms and in his patronising I can fix it attitude. Get to room 917 and go out onto balcony and the view is beautiful, we can see the Gulf. Back into the room and Mr Brittas says, I knew this room would make you happy, it is beautiful view and room is lovely. We agree with him that it is but it only has one bed and we want two. He looks like he might cry and we just want to go home at this point. He tells us he will go and see if he can move people about to find us another room. He offers us room service which we refuse. I mean how would room service no where to find us! We return to room 854 to wait for him.
After 15 minutes Mr Brittas returns and takes us to room 612. On the way there he tells us a story of German tourists visiting a hotel and a smell in the room and how house keeping kept spraying air freshener but the smell didnt go away and a few days later they found a dead body under the bed. He read this in a newspaper. I find it very peculiar as to why he is sharing this with us. Enter room 612 and the view from the balcony is what we paid for, we can see a small section of the car park, the pool, the beach and pier 60. I think the room smells of cats but Tricia cant smell anything. We agree to take it, we have lost the will to fight and I have lost the will to live and neither of us can take much more of this annoying man. Mr Brittas looks relieved. He has to go back to front desk to get us key cards so we ask where we should wait, in this room, room 854 or in the lobby. He says room 854 so we head back there. A while later Bells Service arrives at room 854 to take our luggage to room 612. We tell him(it is a different person and he looks scared) that we dont have keys and he says his manager is bringing them up. Mr Brittas arrives a few minutes later and greets us with HEY you happy? I swear to god that I will deck him if he says it again. On the way down to room 612 he offers to buy us dinner. We say no, he offers to have dinner with us. For his safety we say NO. Eventually we give in and let him buy us a drink so we can get rid of him. When we get into the room I can still smell cats and still Tricia cant. I go to sit on the balcony. Bells Service man leaves and Mr Brittas goes to get our drinks, we had to shout at him that we didnt want alcohol in them, he obviously figured alcohol would make us HAPPY After 5 minutes I see Mr Brittas walk away from the pool bar with our drinks. There is a knock on the door 5 minutes later, its him. Tricia only goes and lets him in!!! He comes right out to the balcony and says, HEY you happy? He waffles on and on and on about a fresh start and how everything is fine now. He then goes on to say what a lovely view we have and how when he stays here the next time he is going to request this room. AS IF!!! I wonder if it will take him 1 hour 15 minutes and 5 rooms before he gets it. Eventually we discover there is a god and he leaves.Discover that the toilet doesnt fill properly after flushing, it flushes continuously. Decide we might be able to put up with this as we couldnt face anymore arguing or Mr Brittas. Went to bed totally scunnered, the Wilderness Lodge seems like a million years ago.
Fell asleep just after 10pm. Didnt set a wake up time, not sure we wanted to waken.
During our stay the hotel lost power because of weather. The hotel fire alarm went off one night but not in our room. On our last day we received a cheque for bar charges, we had never been in the bar.
Throughtout the week we discovered other faults in the room: bubbled wallpaper due to the damp, rust all round the light surrounds in the bathroom, chunk of wood missing from a unit.
Downstairs there were long cracks running through the large mirrors.missing tiles in the underground carpark and tiles that were hanging out.
The comment card I completed in the room was ignored.I did write to Hilton the first letter was ignored. The second received a reply.
We were offered free accomodation on our next trip.AS IF!!!!!!!!!!!
Please stay at a different hotel.
Disney Delights and Hilton Horrors Tour: Day 14 (Move to the Hilton)
Day 14: July 14th
At 4pm our fun really began. Woman who checked us in and then tried to charge us again when we enquired about the room being ready allocates us Room 406 and says she will call Bells Service to have the luggage brought up. Up in the lift we go and the first thing I notice when we step out the lift is how hot the corridor is (turns out the corridors are not air conditioned). Find the room and the card wont open the door, tried various times and it still wouldnt work so we asked the housekeeping lady if we were doing it properly. She explains that sometimes the cards can be sticky and that prevents it from opening. She opens the door with her card and we discover the room is already occupied!!!
Back to front desk. There is a big line and this point. Tricia walks to the front and tells woman what has happened. She is full of apologies and blames housekeeping for passing on the wrong information. She gives us another room and says she will give us vouchers for free breakfasts for the length of our stay. Head off again to room 315. When you book this hotel with Virgin the brochure states you will have a preferred South view and the room will have a balcony. As we were walking down the hot corridor we knew the room was on the wrong side and it was not going to be a South view but we decide to look and if it was nice we just take it. Into room and the curtains were shut. Opened the curtains to see what the view from the balcony was like only to discover the balcony was in fact a wall, we didnt have one and we only had a tiny little window that looked into the air conditioning units for the hotel. Tricia now looks ready to blow a gasket. She went back down to front desk and I stayed in the room because Bells Service were on there way with the luggage. She got the same woman and was told the hotel was full and there were no other rooms, Tricia told her that was fine she would go round to the Virgin office and they could sort it and a room remarkably appeared on the system. Lovely man from Bells Service arrives with the luggage and I explain what was happening. He phones front desk and tells me Tricia is on her way back and that we are going to room 854. He says this is a harbour view and asks if I want to accept it. I tell him we will go and see it. When Tricia arrives we all go to room 854. On the way nice man tells us that front desk are incompetent and they dont even know the layout of the hotel or where any of the rooms are. He says room 406 and room 315 are not even the same price!!! We find room 854 has been refurbished but while the harbour view is lovely when you look off to the right when you look straight ahead you are looking at the roofs of the shops opposite and there is a busy road underneath. We tell nice man we are not staying here. He phones front desk and tells the manager our story. Tricia then goes on the phone and manager asks how she is. She tells him angry and getting angrier by the minute, he doesnt speak for a few minutes and then says he will come up. I have to add that when she told him she was getting angrier nice Bells Service man laughs.
Ten minutes later there is a chap on the door. Bells Service man opens it and in walks the popcorn man!!! His first words are, HEY! Are you happy? He gets the Virgin brochure fired at him to show him what we have paid for and what we want. He tells us how the hotel is full but he has a special room he thinks will make us happy, he keeps this room incase emergencies like this pop up or he has to stay the night. Off we trot to room 917 with popcorn man who has now been renamed Mr Brittas (his real name is Zeljko Nikic). He was so like him in mannerisms and in his patronising I can fix it attitude. Get to room 917 and go out onto balcony and the view is beautiful, we can see the Gulf. Back into the room and Mr Brittas says, I knew this room would make you happy, it is beautiful view and room is lovely. We agree with him that it is but it only has one bed and we want two. He looks like he might cry and we just want to go home at this point. He tells us he will go and see if he can move people about to find us another room. He offers us room service which we refuse. I mean how would room service no where to find us! We return to room 854 to wait for him.
After 15 minutes Mr Brittas returns and takes us to room 612. On the way there he tells us a story of German tourists visiting a hotel and a smell in the room and how house keeping kept spraying air freshener but the smell didnt go away and a few days later they found a dead body under the bed. He read this in a newspaper. I find it very peculiar as to why he is sharing this with us. Enter room 612 and the view from the balcony is what we paid for, we can see a small section of the car park, the pool, the beach and pier 60. I think the room smells of cats but Tricia cant smell anything. We agree to take it, we have lost the will to fight and I have lost the will to live and neither of us can take much more of this annoying man. Mr Brittas looks relieved. He has to go back to front desk to get us key cards so we ask where we should wait, in this room, room 854 or in the lobby. He says room 854 so we head back there. A while later Bells Service arrives at room 854 to take our luggage to room 612. We tell him(it is a different person and he looks scared) that we dont have keys and he says his manager is bringing them up. Mr Brittas arrives a few minutes later and greets us with HEY you happy? I swear to god that I will deck him if he says it again. On the way down to room 612 he offers to buy us dinner. We say no, he offers to have dinner with us. For his safety we say NO. Eventually we give in and let him buy us a drink so we can get rid of him. When we get into the room I can still smell cats and still Tricia cant. I go to sit on the balcony. Bells Service man leaves and Mr Brittas goes to get our drinks, we had to shout at him that we didnt want alcohol in them, he obviously figured alcohol would make us HAPPY After 5 minutes I see Mr Brittas walk away from the pool bar with our drinks. There is a knock on the door 5 minutes later, its him. Tricia only goes and lets him in!!! He comes right out to the balcony and says, HEY you happy? He waffles on and on and on about a fresh start and how everything is fine now. He then goes on to say what a lovely view we have and how when he stays here the next time he is going to request this room. AS IF!!! I wonder if it will take him 1 hour 15 minutes and 5 rooms before he gets it. Eventually we discover there is a god and he leaves.Discover that the toilet doesnt fill properly after flushing, it flushes continuously. Decide we might be able to put up with this as we couldnt face anymore arguing or Mr Brittas. Went to bed totally scunnered, the Wilderness Lodge seems like a million years ago.
Fell asleep just after 10pm. Didnt set a wake up time, not sure we wanted to waken.
During our stay the hotel lost power because of weather. The hotel fire alarm went off one night but not in our room. On our last day we received a cheque for bar charges, we had never been in the bar.
Throughtout the week we discovered other faults in the room: bubbled wallpaper due to the damp, rust all round the light surrounds in the bathroom, chunk of wood missing from a unit.
Downstairs there were long cracks running through the large mirrors.missing tiles in the underground carpark and tiles that were hanging out.
The comment card I completed in the room was ignored.I did write to Hilton the first letter was ignored. The second received a reply.
We were offered free accomodation on our next trip.AS IF!!!!!!!!!!!
Please stay at a different hotel.
ThumperThistle
Flower of Scotland
- Joined
- Apr 28, 2001
- Messages
- 201
Miffy2003 said:Good grief!!! That is a story and a half!
Do you know Tartan Tigger? Your trippie sounds just like the way she writes
Tartan Tigger is my sister, we were there together. She wrote the trip report, I just copied it to post in this thread.
Tricia
stevie-wonder-boy!
i am currently at 33,000ft and still falling!
- Joined
- Dec 22, 2005
- Messages
- 167
i didnt stay in the hotel,but we did have lunch there(excursion from orlando with keith browse)
we had a buffet,it was fab!
it was reallly nice because we sat and ate lunch while looking out onto the lush waters of the gulf!
ste
we had a buffet,it was fab!
it was reallly nice because we sat and ate lunch while looking out onto the lush waters of the gulf!
ste
maggs
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Nov 1, 2003
- Messages
- 773
I have visited the Hilton on two occasions on day trips to Clearwater (two years between each trip) and it had gone downhill massively in my opinion. The food was wonderful first time and barely edible on the second occasion. The beach on the day we went - at the front of the hotel -was absolutely filthy, although people who have gone since have said that it was pristine. I also felt that the service had gone down.hill too.
Maggs
Maggs
My husband and I visited this hotel three years ago, we were married in orlando and were due to stay here for the last week of our holiday. We lasted about two hours. The room was horrible, it had cigarette burns in the curtains the toilet was broken and there were big cracks in the sink and bath. It was nothing like the video they show on the web site. We got virgin to move us and ended up paying extra to stay at the Sheraton Sand Key. We had a beautiful room with fantastic view and the hotel was gorgeous the only problem was that it was a bit out the way but the hotel was so nice we spent most of the time there.
traceycooper
<font color=royalblue>Laughs off her mini dramas<b
- Joined
- Feb 22, 2002
- Messages
- 3,843
Oh PLEASE PLEASE somebody out there who has travelled to this hotel with Virgin tell me something good!!!!
We are getting married at this hotel in November
We are getting married at this hotel in November
traceycooper
<font color=royalblue>Laughs off her mini dramas<b
- Joined
- Feb 22, 2002
- Messages
- 3,843
bump 
magicmouse2
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- May 15, 2003
- Messages
- 3,997
We lunched there during Dolphin boat excursion. I thought the hotel was nice and quite upscale. Excellent location for outdoor playpark and beach slide. Restaurant was quite nice and interior restrooms were immaculate. I would have no hesitation to stay here if we stayed on Clearwater for any no of nights. And this is coming from a resort snob who has stayed at the Grand Floridian at WDW. 
traceycooper
<font color=royalblue>Laughs off her mini dramas<b
- Joined
- Feb 22, 2002
- Messages
- 3,843
phew at last some good news!! thanks will give a trip/wedding report when we return
ThumperThistle
Flower of Scotland
- Joined
- Apr 28, 2001
- Messages
- 201
magicmouse2 said:We lunched there during Dolphin boat excursion. I thought the hotel was nice and quite upscale. Excellent location for outdoor playpark and beach slide. Restaurant was quite nice and interior restrooms were immaculate. I would have no hesitation to stay here if we stayed on Clearwater for any no of nights. And this is coming from a resort snob who has stayed at the Grand Floridian at WDW.
In July 2004 we did a day trip to Clearwater for the Seascreamer trip and had use of the hotel facilities. We had the same thoughts as yourself,great location, nice restuarant, immaculate toilets on the lobby level.
Thats why we booked for 7 nights the following year. I now realise you should NEVER judge a book by it's cover. The public areas and the rooms are very different.
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