Sinoway Hotel

I stayed in Sinoway Hotel for 9 days (I know, oddly long, but I travelled there to helped out my gf move in to her university dorm). Anyways, I arrived at around 8PM by taxi (131 RMB but would be around 110 RMB without traffic). A little bit disappointed that the bellhop didn't assist with the luggages despite being huge hotel. It was quite a hassle checking-in as the reception couldn't speak any English and seem to not have recognized my booking detail via booking.com. Nonetheless, they managed to get me a room (though, I realized the day later when I inquired them that they only booked me for 3 nights! If I hadn't ask them, I would have been kicked out prematurely). Those staying here, please be warned that smell of smoke will greet you the moment you step out of the elevator (mine is on 11th floor). Fortunately the smell ends at the doorway. The room was quite spacious and amenities are all there (and they refill everyday even if you didn't use them). TV channels are all in Chinese so don't bother if you don't know the language. The location is particularly good as it is surrounded by department stores and malls which has various food available (though quite limited). There is also Carrefour 10-minute walk from the hotel (has KFC, Pizza Hut, hotpot) and underground retail store in the Hongbo square (the circle-ly square with underground passageways). Mcdonalds, starbucks, and another KFC are 5 minute walk on different direction. If you plan to travel to Zhongyang street, take bus no. 47 (right next to the hotel) or no. 8 (have to walk a bit to the bus station), both will take you right to the street ,or by taxi (around 10-12 RMB). if you plan on going to the Sun Island, you can take the taxi to the pier which is also at the end of zhongyang street and take the ferry (2RMB/person). Taxi from hotel to airport, if you ask them to call for you, will be 150 RMB. But, if you hail on your own, it would be around 110-115 RMB.

The hotel is centrally located,easy to locate. Some staff speak English,as the hotel is on Booking. Com,more staff should be trained to speak English . Staff were polite and friendly and eager to please. Breakfast was a good selection of East and West but they could give the option of cutlery instead of chopsticks & spoon. A very Enjoyable stay and we hope to return someday.👍👍👍

We booked this hotel the day before arriving through booking.com due to a mix up with our other accommodation. We arrived at 11am at the hotel and their check in policy is 2pm so we expected to just leave our bags at reception and come back later. However, unbeknownst to us there was a conference on, therefore there was police that was guarding the front door, metal detectors and security in the lobby. All that was fine with us, however when we went to do our check in process we were told that due to this conference we couldn't check in until 6pm (this may have been on the official Hotel website but was not communicated to booking.com). At first we were like 'as long as we can leave our bags then we will come back'. The hotel is located within a 3 minute walk from 2 major multi level shopping centres so we went and explored a bit whilst we waited, but by 4pm we were exhausted. We went back to the hotel and were prepared to argue our point, however the staff were very nice. They put me on the phone to a lovely lady who spoke English and I explained that we had gotten up at 4am to make a flight from Beijing, and that we are not used to -25 degrees (centigrade) weather, all we wanted to do was to shower and have a nap. She was very understanding and helped the other staff to check us in, although we went through the service lift to the room. They also gave us a free upgrade to an executive suite. My only real issue with the hotel was that the room stunk like smoke because you can smoke in it and it was a little dated. Other than that we tried their buffet breakfast just to see how it is. Honestly do not recommend it to anyone unless they want to go on a palate adventure. I do need to commend the staff who throughout our 3 days stay there went above and beyond to communicate with us and be friendly towards us and help us out regardless of language barriers (google translate doesn't help most of the time lol). Just for their friendliness we would stay there again if we visited Harbin for the Ice festival in the future.