We stayed here on a trip to the UK for New Year - 5 nights. The hotel is about 5 minutes walk from Gloucester Road tube station along Cromwell Road. Earls Court station is actually closer but a more complicated walking route.

The area is good for many reasons - reasonably convenient for the museums, including the V&A Museum which is less than a mile away. Hyde Park is fairly close for a morning walk and you can hire cycles from the park entrance (the stand is part of the 'Barclays Bicycle Hire' system). Also, there's a supermarket almost opposite the hotel itself, and a wide variety of cafes and restaurants nearby. It's a nice area for a stroll.

The service is excellent (usually!). Last time we came, maybe 2 years ago, the check-in guy was very helpful suggesting local places to go, without having to be asked. We assumed he was just a compulsively chatty person, although we got the same thing this time from someone else. Perhaps it's some Marriott thing, but anyway, they were very personable and friendly. We were impressed.

The rooms were nice, modern, although this time a bit smaller than the last time even though we paid more. I guess there is a certain 'luck of the draw' involved.

The facilities were OK, but could be improved a little. The lobby PC crashed every time we tried to print boarding passes, so the front-desk staff helped out with their own PC. Still, they seem to have some strange system running on the guests' lobby PC that isn't so reliable. WiFi speed was OK but it's slightly pricey.

The only thing that annoyed us when we arrived was it took a very long time to get checked-in. One of the front desk staff was dealing with some quite involved problem, and no-one opened another check-in. We waited. Soon there were three people at the concierge desk, and no-one thought to come over or call anyone. I went over and tried to get their attention. They were deep in conversation. After some initial patience, then a few very obvious attempts to make eye contact with passing staff, finally another staff member happened by and helped out. That's the one hint for the staff - if someone's waiting, don't assume someone else is dealing with it, check. And if you're the busy one on the front desk, and see others waiting, call someone.

Still, that glitch in the service excepted, service was good.