Hilton Antwerp {BEL}
Nov 30, 2006, 6:51 am
#31
Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: DCA/IAD
Programs: UA 2.5MM; HH Diamond; Hyatt Platinum; MR Gold
Posts: 1,355
I stayed at the Hilton Antwerp as a HH Gold from Sunday 10/8 to Tuesday 10/10 and got the upgrade to the executive floor. I also rec'd a box of chocolates, fruit plate, and daily bottles of water. I didn't check in at the lounge, but did check out there. I saw others checking in, but don't know what their HH status was. I was very pleased with my visit and will stay there again. As others have commented, the location simply can't be beat.
Nov 30, 2006, 7:20 am
#32
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Phuket
Programs: SQ *Gold, BA, QR, EY, Hilton Diamond, IHG Platinum, Marriott Gold, Amex Platinum
Posts: 5,269
I stayed at the Hilton Antwerp as a HH Gold from Sunday 10/8 to Tuesday 10/10 and got the upgrade to the executive floor. I also rec'd a box of chocolates, fruit plate, and daily bottles of water. I didn't check in at the lounge, but did check out there. I saw others checking in, but don't know what their HH status was. I was very pleased with my visit and will stay there again. As others have commented, the location simply can't be beat.
Nov 30, 2006, 11:34 pm
#34
Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: Corvallis, OR, USA
Programs: UA GS; Hilton LT Diamond, Marriott, Hyatt; Hertz
Posts: 321
I stayed there recently as a Diamond and was upgraded to a suite overlooking the square. The lounge is very nice and the concierge service is great. The lounge breakfast is good (although the same every day), and the evening "snacks" are wonderful (and a meal in themselves). The hotel charges the usual for (Wireless) Internet access, but if you happen to be on the plaza side you can pick up public access WiFi.
You will have a great time!
You will have a great time!
Dec 1, 2006, 1:11 pm
#35
Join Date: Dec 2001
Location: BRU, SIN, PEK
Programs: SQ TPP, LH SEN
Posts: 3,235
Yeah, I'm totally guilty of settling dinner just munching off lounge offerings. I'm not a big eater, and when I travel alone it's just easier and faster to mooch at the lounge. Not the healthiest, but it'll do in a pinch.
Dec 15, 2006, 8:22 am
#37
Join Date: Apr 2006
Programs: BA Silver, Marriott Plat, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 327
Dec 17, 2006, 5:13 pm
#38
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: If only I knew
Programs: Several of my own making in which I was recently fast-tracked to super-duper-über-elite status
Posts: 1,074
One of my favorite cities in Europe and one of my favorite Hiltons. Nice rooms and excellent exec lounge.
My first stay at this hotel convinced me to swtich my loyalty to the HH program.
Jan 8, 2007, 3:23 pm
#39
Join Date: Apr 2006
Programs: BA Silver, Marriott Plat, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 327
Quick trip report:
Location was great, and good comfortable rooms. Upgrade given without a hesitation.
Great city - lots to see and do
Downsides:
Gym was poor, and you can't bring in liquids, as they want to sell you small bottles of water for a couple of euro a pop
Lounge discipline was bad: On new years eve, there was a group of 10 Americans in there shouting across the lounge at each other. After 20 minutes, they managed to clear the lounge of all other guests.
No smoking signs in the Exec lounge were ignored completely. One evening there was a gang of teenage boys in there smoking away, and coughing and spluttering all over the food.
Location was great, and good comfortable rooms. Upgrade given without a hesitation.
Great city - lots to see and do
Downsides:
Gym was poor, and you can't bring in liquids, as they want to sell you small bottles of water for a couple of euro a pop
Lounge discipline was bad: On new years eve, there was a group of 10 Americans in there shouting across the lounge at each other. After 20 minutes, they managed to clear the lounge of all other guests.
No smoking signs in the Exec lounge were ignored completely. One evening there was a gang of teenage boys in there smoking away, and coughing and spluttering all over the food.
Jan 8, 2007, 10:07 pm
#40
Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: MSP (Mahtomedi, MN, USA) - Delta hub captive, Marriott Gold, US Mint Silver, CVS Red
Programs: "We've been starving, and sitting on a ham sandwich the whole time."
Posts: 1,482
Quick trip report:
...
Lounge discipline was bad: On new years eve, there was a group of 10 Americans in there shouting across the lounge at each other. After 20 minutes, they managed to clear the lounge of all other guests.
No smoking signs in the Exec lounge were ignored completely. One evening there was a gang of teenage boys in there smoking away, and coughing and spluttering all over the food.
...
Lounge discipline was bad: On new years eve, there was a group of 10 Americans in there shouting across the lounge at each other. After 20 minutes, they managed to clear the lounge of all other guests.
No smoking signs in the Exec lounge were ignored completely. One evening there was a gang of teenage boys in there smoking away, and coughing and spluttering all over the food.
:P
Jan 10, 2007, 12:29 pm
#41
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Newcastle, UK
Posts: 108
May 8, 2007, 10:44 am
#42
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: Madison, WI USA
Posts: 107
Gold experience
Just returned from a 3-day award stay at this property. The location is excellent. Service was so-so. We did not get upgraded to the executive level despite there being availability for sale on hilton.com. After prompting we were given the buffet breakfast each day in the restaurant. It was a good buffet, but not outstanding. There is a note about renovation in progress but we didn't see or hear any signs of it.
Hotel was a little old fashioned, showed some wear, and had a musty smell in the hall. The mattresses aren't very comfy but the linens were nice. Big Bathroom but not well appointed so it felt like wasted space.
IMPORTANT: if you are not on the executive level or in one of the business rooms/suites then in-room coffee tea service is not included which is pretty harsh if you also aren't getting into the lounge! They are happy to provide it for 25 euros per stay... We were able to successfully persuade them to comp it since this wasn't what we were expecting.
On the positive side, the room was very large compared to Brussels and Amsterdam! Also, don't expect the hotel rooms to reflect the style of the front of the hotel that is shown in the photos. That is an facade that was preserved which the current hotel was built behind. Entrance to the hotel is actually on the left side of the building. If you are coming from the shops on Meier you can also cut thru the shopping center.
Overall it rated about a 6 1/2 out of 10.
Hotel was a little old fashioned, showed some wear, and had a musty smell in the hall. The mattresses aren't very comfy but the linens were nice. Big Bathroom but not well appointed so it felt like wasted space.
IMPORTANT: if you are not on the executive level or in one of the business rooms/suites then in-room coffee tea service is not included which is pretty harsh if you also aren't getting into the lounge! They are happy to provide it for 25 euros per stay... We were able to successfully persuade them to comp it since this wasn't what we were expecting.
On the positive side, the room was very large compared to Brussels and Amsterdam! Also, don't expect the hotel rooms to reflect the style of the front of the hotel that is shown in the photos. That is an facade that was preserved which the current hotel was built behind. Entrance to the hotel is actually on the left side of the building. If you are coming from the shops on Meier you can also cut thru the shopping center.
Overall it rated about a 6 1/2 out of 10.
May 8, 2007, 1:24 pm
#43
Join Date: May 2003
Location: Eurozone
Programs: LH SEN, HH Gold
Posts: 3,002
Thanks for the update, ronamc. We were upgraded to the exec floor on our last stay a couple months ago and we noticed a slip in service in the lounge while we were there. We'll have to take this into consideration (or at least make an advance phone call to the hotel to set the stage) before our next trip.
May 9, 2007, 1:11 pm
#44
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: MAN and LON
Programs: Mucci, BAEC LT Gold, HH Dia, MR LT Plat, IHG Diamond Amb, Amex Plat
Posts: 13,773
My GF and I returned from the Hilton Antwerp after a paid 2 night stay yesterday. We were upgraded to an Exec Room (although a smaller rather than larger one). I would describe the service as truly awful at this hotel. Very little went well during our stay, we had no welcome letter, we had no in room amenity (fruit plates seemed to be standard in all other rooms accompanied by small vases of flowers, neither of which we received).
We booked a dinner inclusive rate for the first night and the restaurant service was so poor it would have been funny if it hadn't been so annoying. Food took forever to arrive and then one of the 2 main courses arrived cold.
We were staying to celebrate my GF's birthday and there was no acknowledgement of this (despite the comments in the booking) until I made the observation on the last night of our stay after seeing the welcome letters being prepared for other guests (offering free champagne for HH members when eating in the restaurant, which would have been nice to know at the time
).
The best part of our stay was dinner at the nearby "Sir Antony Van Dyck" Restaurant (strongly recommended), upon our return we could not access our room with the room keys. We had to trudge back to the main reception to get new keys only to repeat the experience. We then had to return to reception etc. etc.
We did finally get into our room just before midnight (and we were departing for the airport 6 hours later) at this point we found that we had received a bottle of Leffe (rather late in the day to be opened and unable to be taken in our hand luggage for our flights) and some chocs.
I got the feeling this could be a great hotel, the location is good, the rooms were OK, the lounge had promise (although I did not see any champagne, only some fairly unappealing sparkling wine, luckily I brought some Krug along myself). The biggest problem was the staff (or lack of them). The lounge appeared to be staffed only about 50% of the time and the quality of staff elsewhere left much to be desired.
We booked a dinner inclusive rate for the first night and the restaurant service was so poor it would have been funny if it hadn't been so annoying. Food took forever to arrive and then one of the 2 main courses arrived cold.
We were staying to celebrate my GF's birthday and there was no acknowledgement of this (despite the comments in the booking) until I made the observation on the last night of our stay after seeing the welcome letters being prepared for other guests (offering free champagne for HH members when eating in the restaurant, which would have been nice to know at the time
).The best part of our stay was dinner at the nearby "Sir Antony Van Dyck" Restaurant (strongly recommended), upon our return we could not access our room with the room keys. We had to trudge back to the main reception to get new keys only to repeat the experience. We then had to return to reception etc. etc.
We did finally get into our room just before midnight (and we were departing for the airport 6 hours later) at this point we found that we had received a bottle of Leffe (rather late in the day to be opened and unable to be taken in our hand luggage for our flights) and some chocs.
I got the feeling this could be a great hotel, the location is good, the rooms were OK, the lounge had promise (although I did not see any champagne, only some fairly unappealing sparkling wine, luckily I brought some Krug along myself). The biggest problem was the staff (or lack of them). The lounge appeared to be staffed only about 50% of the time and the quality of staff elsewhere left much to be desired.
May 12, 2007, 4:24 pm
#45
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Phuket
Programs: SQ *Gold, BA, QR, EY, Hilton Diamond, IHG Platinum, Marriott Gold, Amex Platinum
Posts: 5,269
My GF and I returned from the Hilton Antwerp after a paid 2 night stay yesterday. We were upgraded to an Exec Room (although a smaller rather than larger one). I would describe the service as truly awful at this hotel. Very little went well during our stay, we had no welcome letter, we had no in room amenity (fruit plates seemed to be standard in all other rooms accompanied by small vases of flowers, neither of which we received).
We booked a dinner inclusive rate for the first night and the restaurant service was so poor it would have been funny if it hadn't been so annoying. Food took forever to arrive and then one of the 2 main courses arrived cold.
We were staying to celebrate my GF's birthday and there was no acknowledgement of this (despite the comments in the booking) until I made the observation on the last night of our stay after seeing the welcome letters being prepared for other guests (offering free champagne for HH members when eating in the restaurant, which would have been nice to know at the time ).
The best part of our stay was dinner at the nearby "Sir Antony Van Dyck" Restaurant (strongly recommended), upon our return we could not access our room with the room keys. We had to trudge back to the main reception to get new keys only to repeat the experience. We then had to return to reception etc. etc.
We did finally get into our room just before midnight (and we were departing for the airport 6 hours later) at this point we found that we had received a bottle of Leffe (rather late in the day to be opened and unable to be taken in our hand luggage for our flights) and some chocs.
I got the feeling this could be a great hotel, the location is good, the rooms were OK, the lounge had promise (although I did not see any champagne, only some fairly unappealing sparkling wine, luckily I brought some Krug along myself). The biggest problem was the staff (or lack of them). The lounge appeared to be staffed only about 50% of the time and the quality of staff elsewhere left much to be desired.
We booked a dinner inclusive rate for the first night and the restaurant service was so poor it would have been funny if it hadn't been so annoying. Food took forever to arrive and then one of the 2 main courses arrived cold.
We were staying to celebrate my GF's birthday and there was no acknowledgement of this (despite the comments in the booking) until I made the observation on the last night of our stay after seeing the welcome letters being prepared for other guests (offering free champagne for HH members when eating in the restaurant, which would have been nice to know at the time
).The best part of our stay was dinner at the nearby "Sir Antony Van Dyck" Restaurant (strongly recommended), upon our return we could not access our room with the room keys. We had to trudge back to the main reception to get new keys only to repeat the experience. We then had to return to reception etc. etc.
We did finally get into our room just before midnight (and we were departing for the airport 6 hours later) at this point we found that we had received a bottle of Leffe (rather late in the day to be opened and unable to be taken in our hand luggage for our flights) and some chocs.
I got the feeling this could be a great hotel, the location is good, the rooms were OK, the lounge had promise (although I did not see any champagne, only some fairly unappealing sparkling wine, luckily I brought some Krug along myself). The biggest problem was the staff (or lack of them). The lounge appeared to be staffed only about 50% of the time and the quality of staff elsewhere left much to be desired.
