This is the best hotel in Africa.The best service Very clean hotel room.Friendly employee and professional .Pool are nice and clean.The best cappuccino in Asmara.Dinner ,lunch and B/fast was good ……The service in this hotel is the best!!!
We stayed here several nights. Hotel was posh and rooms very nice. Can't compare with Western hotels though. Service was friendly and in the 3500 in local currency we paid breakfast was included. On the premises there was a swimming pool, a gym and tennis Courts as well as several shops, cafes and restaurants. WiFi was ok in lobby but did not work in room. The hotel is several km from downtown but close ro airport.
This was my second stay at the Asmara Palance (previously the Intercontinental). I really enjoyed my stay - the room is a good standard albeit the carpets could do with a facelift. The staff are super friendly and polite. We ate in the restaurant and had room service and would recommend both. The breakfast selection is good (hot and cold).
We spent most of our time by the pool (indoor and outdoor) and children's playground. We forgot our gym kit at home so were unable to take advantage of the facililities but they looked good. There were also a sauna and steam rooms. On the hotel grounds, we used the hairdressers and dry cleaners which was handy. The hotel is a short drive/ walk to town so very central.
Overall, a great stay for a very decent price.
Just a few kilometers from the airport, this is one of the most internationally oriented hotels in Asmara, with good rooms, friendly staff and good restaurants and café's. Staying here was pleasant and offered no great surprises. The room was spacious, clean and with everything needed to stay a few days in comfort. Internet was very slow and weak, but at least I was able to read and answer email every once in a while. This first seemed to be a major downer, until I learned that internet is slow and weak everywhere else as well... Eritrea appears to be one of the most isolated countries on the planet, as your mobile phone will not work as well, and foreigners cannot buy SIM-cards, not even for national phone calls. If you accept these restrictions, start enjoying the hotel and the city, which is close by.
Special mention should be made of the food. Apart from the Eritrean cuisine Asmara has many Italian restaurants. The hotel has an Italian restaurant and I had to return for another pasta as it was so delicious. Less positive was the breakfast in the main restaurant, which was minimal and not very fresh. Again an exception was the cooking: during my stay I had some excellent omelets for breakfast, including one with chili's, which seems to be a local favorite (they also put it on some pizzas).
The Asmara Palace Hotel is the best that Asmara has, but regrettably, it would earn about a C- in most other contexts. It's a large, generic place in the spirit of 'corporate chain hotel meets under-used shopping mall in Nowheresville.' Characterless and mediocre by most measurements, when it tries to import character, like with its so-called Irish pub ("Green Pub"), the hotel fails for lack of effort and authenticity. Breakfast isn't bad -- the occasional flies and pigeons in the dining hall agree with me there! Both species were able to fly in; you should expect to rely heavily on taxis to get anywhere worthwhile due to the hotel's remote location.
But here's my biggest gripe: I chose the Asmara Palace because it included free WiFi and accepted credit cards; no other hotel in town claims this. The Internet connection, already dreadfully slow on a 32Kps service (think dial-up modem circa 1997!), stopped working halfway through my week there. Staff dishonestly kept claiming that it would be back up soon, for four days running.
In the meantime I discovered that the hotel business center has a working Internet connection... that they were charging extra for, no matter that my $135 per night room already, supposedly, included 'free WiFi!' I was given the minor accommodation of a hand-written voucher for two hours of computer time on my last day at the hotel. But I'd already called home to assure all that I was okay, a $29 call.
If Asmara wants to join the twenty-first century, this hotel needs to step up.
Here are a few more negative things: the air conditioning doesn't work properly, with no correspondence between thermostat and response; guests can expect the power to go out once or twice a day -- the hotel generator kicks on within seconds, but it is disconcerting, especially if one is in the shower; and finally, the carpet in my room was dingy and stained. Because the balcony door isn't screened, I also got a good number of mosquito bites.
Positives: the bed was comfortable and the room was generously proportioned. And this: Asmara's one brewery wasn't producing beer for some reason so the week I was there no cafe or bar or restaurant had beer. Except for the Asmara Palace Hotel, in my room's minibar and in the hotel bar!
Asmara Palace is the best in the city I was there from Dec 9th to Dec 12th. It's 5 star hotel with decent rooms and amenities nearing Asmara airport only 3 minutes.
Brake fast is average with little varieties however juice and fruits was always fresh and delicious.
Hotel guest were the top social class in the city usually there are a lot of locals at night in cafe, around swimming pool, in Green pub.
In general Eritrean are so nice and polite, helpful and trustful. I really enjoyed my short stay in Asmara and wish if I could do it again.
