Westin Grand Munich
Munich, Germany.
Junior Suite
When I happened to book this trip, I had some how forgotten that it was Oktoberfest. When I checked the prices of hotels, the room rates were pretty steep. Rooms at the central properties near the Hauptbhanhof in Munich were nearing 400€ a night. I decided that the way around this was to use SPG points for the Munich hotel room as we both had two free weekend nights awards from two separate credit cards from meeting a minimum spend threshold on our Canadian SPG American Express.
The Aloft near the Hautbahnhoff had a sneaky 3 night minimum stay requirement (despite the no blackout dates on rewards rooms) so we couldn’t go in there for a two night stay. Le Meridien Munich was showing as completely full, so we opted for the Westin Grand Munich which seemed to be the best choice over the Four Points properties that I have to frequent for work on a regular basis.
We took the S8 train from Munich airport, switching to the U4 and arrived door to door 1 hr and 45 minutes door. Not the best performance, today and we should have probably taken a car instead. The hotel is a bit of a seventies-esque type structure with little visual appeal. The model out front was not included in the stay. =)
This was the first Starwood hotel that I have been to that offers a giant pretzel from a rack at the front desk. On arrival, we were given a SPG Platinum suite upgrade at the front counter on check in. We were on back to back reservations in my name and MrsWT73’s name (only SPG Gold) but despite a little “Tetris” at the front desk, there were unable to keep us in the suite both nights. They were very accommodating to have us in the room immediately next to ours on the second night.
Junior Suite 1803 was actually two standard rooms that had been converted into a suite. Passing through to each area was through the a-joining door. Instead of a bed in the other room, there was lounger sofa bed. The room was nicely situated on the corner of the building, so the room had nice light throughout the living side.
There was a standard bathroom in the main room.
Over next door in the joining suite… … with an easy pass through.
There was a full bathroom in the living area of the suite.
It was a comfortable way to have two nights and actually a very separate space between the areas as MrsWT73 took to arranging her packing for the homeward trip and I didn’t see her for the rest of the evening.
We ended up taking dinner in the lounge on our second night there. The hotel was kind enough to allow us both the lounge access as a Plat, even though the booking was under my wife’s name (SPG gold).
At the time of writing, the lounge was a sectioned off area of the main restaurant on the ground floor. The lounge offering was a generous spread and I was quite impressed with the quantity and quality of food.
There were lots of food available, both hot and cold.
Heaps of food here – you could feed a small village. You get the idea.
There were wines and beers available, although there no spirits available (or obviously available).
The only minus about the property was the slightly inconvenient location that had the hotel a few stops out of the downtown core on the S train. It’s also not super convenient to get to and from the Munich airport. Our taxi out of here on the early morning the day of our departure was a 65€ sting.
The Westin Grand Munich was a comfortable but not ideally situated place to stay for our trip. Being a free stay, it was more than adequate for our needs and we’d easily return if we had business in the area. The service levels were also strong and they went out of their way to accommodate us.