Me and my girlfriend stayed in the Harbour Hotel in April 2006 and had a fantastic time in Galway. You can't go wrong if you stay in the Harbour Hotel. I have read a few comments about how you can hear every noise coming from the other rooms and you can hear the coal depot that is open 24 hours a day. To be fair we were sleeping on the otherside of the hotel to the coal yard but personally I never heard anything except the bustling city which doesn't seem to sleep!!! but I don't mean this in a bad way. The hotel is literally 2 minutes walk to the centre of Galway city (Eyre Square) and all the bars / resteraunts. The breakfasts were exactly what you'd expect from this standard of hotel and I certainly wasn't left hungry in the morning with a wide selection on offer. The staff in the hotel we're very curteous and helpful and adhered to my special request of a harbour view which was much appreciated. The room was spacious and clean with a very comfy bed and good TV with plenty of channels. We arrived an hour and a half earlier than the check in time and we were still given a room straight away which again was much appreciated. We will definitely be back in Galway and it'll be hard to look past the Harbour Hotel for somewhere to stay Higjly recommended!!!!!!!!!!

I stayed as part of a group of seven at the end of March, all of us mamagers of serveral hotels around the country.
Check in wasnt great, they couldnt find our names in the system but covered it up well.
But thats it with the problems.
The lobby is absolutely lovely, yuo could sit in there all day having drinks on the deep leather couches(which we did)
All we wanted from the hotel was to be able to sit in all day and catch up and we found ourselves sitting in the lobby by the fire from 3pm til they closed the bar!
Rooms were lovely, bathrooms need updating, but large and inviting.
Food good, nice room, seriously we couldnt really fault it.
FOrget the view, its awful but it is in the centre of Galway, what do you want?
I recommend, recommend, recommend.

We stayed at the Harbour hotel in November 2005. We arrived without reservation in early evening. There was free garage parking. The lobby was modern décor, large and nice. The receptionist was very friendly. We asked for a large room and was given a large king bedroom. Our room had a king size bed, a coffee maker, a sofa and modern furniture, and a large bathroom. The room was very clean. However, the wall was very thin and we felt like we were part of the next door party. We asked for a room change because of the noise. The receptionist was very patient and looked for a room with no occupants on either side. Our new room was again large with a queen size bed, a sofa and the nice modern furniture. The view was the parking garage so we kept the curtain closed. Breakfast was included and it was buffet style with many selections. The food was great. The location was convenient; 10 minutes walk to city center, at outskirt of city center so it was quick, no traffic to deal with when we left the city by car. The only down side was the view of coal and gas refinery across the street from the hotel. There was no bad smell, just the look made it a bit industrialized, but it didn’t affect our stay. We love the room, the lobby, the breakfast, and the free covered parking. It was great value and we highly recommend it.

I can't believe this is a 4 star hotel (so they say themselves)! Myself & my husband stayed there last weekend, and nearly the only good thing about it was that it was free (hubby had won it as a prize), which is the only reason we didn't make a big fuss about it. First the good points : Lobby very nice, good secure & free carpark, lovely cafetiere in room with real coffee, and it's proximity to the city centre (walking distance). Bad points : the immediate surrounding area is horrible - enormous unattractive coal yard on one side (coal trucks coming in and out 24 hours a day), giant industrial oil company's chimneys on the other side, very high ugly brick wall between the two, and the harbour at the back (though most of the harbour view is blocked by a development of ugly flats). The only other available view is below - the carpark.
Our room (111) looked out on the high brick wall at the front, but the road was very noisy with heavy goods vehicles going by all night. The room was a good size but very unimaginately decorated (for what is described as a modern 4 star hotel) - more like a travellodge type place. Furniture cheap argos/ikea type stuff. Bed very hard. Bathroom dreadful - badly in need of refurb, shower into bath and the curtain sucks in to you as you're standing there and sticks to your body throughout the horrible experience. YUK! Walls paper thin and could hear everything either side and out in the corridor - not very private or relaxing.
Dinner was dreadful - waitress INSISTED "Sauvignon Blanc" was red wine. Menu sounded appealing but we were very disappointed. Hubby's minute steak was minute, was well done rather than rare, and smothered in what tasted like bisto gravy rather than the creamy peppercorn sauce described. My chicken was dry & overcooked and accompanied by a "cucumber & honey raita" which was sickeningly sweet and very unattractive looking on the plate. Served with potatoes, carrots & mange tout (all boiled till v. soft) and two of the potatoes were actually green!Waitress was not able to tell us if the cream in the profiteroles was sweetened as "the profiteroles come in already filled" - imagine, a 4 star hotel that readily admits they don't make their own desserts!
On to breakfast, served by request in our room : They got the order completely wrong and hubby ended up with no sausages or bacon (till I shared), his beans were crispy (yes, CRISPY!) - had obviously been left under a heat lamp for quite some time and they hadn't even bothered stirring them to try to cover it up! Eggs were completely rubberised and inedible. Orange juice tasted like a manufactured mixture between grapefruit juice & orange juice - had never seen a real piece of fruit. Grapefruit was out of a tin. Coffee was cold (actually cold) and like tar - so much so that the milk didn't turn it brown, it turned it dark grey. We had to go out for breakfast straight away.
Feel I've said enough! Can only guess/hope that the hotel's entire kitchen staff had walked out earlier on Friday - they couldn't possibly have a head chef or even a commi chef in that kitchen.

Wouldn't go back there again, even if it was another free weekend.