We needed to stay in Rochester for 9 days while my husband had surgery. I did a lot of research for a hotel and I found exactly what I was looking for! A good rate (we got the Mayo Patient Rate), an extended stay room with kitchen so I could save on meals (this hotel has both regular rooms and the extended stay rooms), a decent breakfast, a pool for our kids to play in, and free shuttle service.
It is an older location but the decor was pleasant and we found all of it to be clean.
This hotel more than met our expectations on most accounts!
First the pros:
Our room was very comfortable, we had a separate bedroom with a comfortable king bed and in the living room there was a murphy bed (I think it was queen size, it easily slept two of our kids), a kitchen that had a stove, microwave, full-size fridge and a small dishwasher. The room was clean and every day it was cleaned and re-stocked. I have no complaints on housekeeping. It was quite later in the day when the room was cleaned but we were often out at the hospital and it wasn't an issue for us.
The hotel has a nice sized pool, a kiddie pool and a decent sized hot tub. It also has an arcade and fitness room. We didn't use the arcade much but we used the pool twice and we enjoyed this amenity.
Breakfast was decent. There were many choices including waffles, fresh fruit, scrambled eggs, sausage, cereal, donuts, juice, coffee and more. For a complimentary meal it was better than many hotels I've been at and I couldn't complain about the food.
Best of all was the shuttle service! This is an on-call service as they will take you where you want to go in Rochester, and usually we only waited about 10-15 minutes (often at the hospital or clinic it was only 5 minutes). I think there was one day I had to wait 20 minutes but in a 9 day stay that's not bad. One evening my daughter and I asked them to take us to the mall and when we called the hotel for pickup they were very prompt. The best part of this was the drivers. We adored these hard working folks! They were very kind, often made pleasant conversation. One evening I watched a female driver take great care to help and elderly gentleman from the shuttle. She treated him with dignity and respect and I was very impressed. Considering the good rate that we had for our room, I think the shuttle service alone made our stay a great value!
Cons: My only complaint was that with 4 buildings full of guests, the breakfast dining area is too small and some mornings it was difficult to find a place to sit down with my plate. While this is a bit of a frustration my real irritation was that every day I there was at least one and sometimes two tables being taken up by hotel staff having a break. I understand they need breaks and need a place to relax during their breaks, but I think that taking up space intended for guests during a time that was very busy was not appropriate customer service.
Overall, we were very pleased and would recommend this to location to anyone.
Room Tip: Make sure you know that what room you are getting, if it is a regular hotel room in the main buildin...
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This review is the subjective opinion of a TripAdvisor member and not of TripAdvisor LLC.
October 17, 2012
Thank you so much for reviewing your stay at the Best Western Soldiers Field. We couldn’t be happier with the experience you and your family had while staying with us. I am glad to hear that your room met your family’s needs and was spacious enough to accommodate you and your kids. I am pleased you were able to relax and enjoy the pool area on a couple of occasions during your stay, it is a great way to break up the week while here for medical appointments. Glad you and your kids enjoyed it. Thank you for your comments regarding our breakfast buffet, we have revamped that as well since your stay with us and now have new items on our rotating hot breakfast such as Egg Bakes and a Meat, Egg, and Cheese Scramble with homemade American fries. We have also ordered a pancake machine and are excited to see how our guests like the additional options. I am thrilled with the service you received from our shuttle drivers. They are definitely one of a kind and we love each and every one of them for their compassion for our guests. Thanks for your comments regarding Cori, she will be excited to hear that you noticed her caring and effort in helping all of our guests. I am sorry to hear that at times there was not enough space to dine in the breakfast area. We do have an additional dining space, which is our Magnolia Room, a few steps down the hall and apologize that our staff did not have that open for you and our other guests. We have addressed this with our Breakfast staff. Thank you also for letting us know about the breakfast staff and their breaks. I have never seen this as they probably would not do it in front of me and without guests like you we would never know of these issues and we sincerely thank you for bringing that to our attention. We have already spoken to them and they were sorry for their inconsideration. Thanks again for all of your comments and helping us resolve issues. We hope to see you again if you are ever in the Rochester area. If you would like to discuss anything further, please do not hesitate to contact me, myron@soldiersfield.com.
Sincerely, Myron Salz
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This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of TripAdvisor LLC.