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Old Sep 10, 2018, 1:22 am
  #8  
escape4
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
Location: Homeless
Programs: Hyatt Glob; Hilton Dia; Marriott AMB; Accor Dia; IHG Dia Amb; GHA Tit
Posts: 4,837
Hilton Istanbul Kozyatagi = Cheaper Alternative on Asian Side of Town

Introduction I had a quick 1-night stay at Hilton Istanbul Kozyatagi to check out this property. Hotels on the Asian side of Istanbul are significantly cheaper than the European side so paying 50 EUR for a night in a full-service hotel with executive lounge and benefiting from the current promotions of 2,500 Lufthansa miles on top of Hilton double points made the stay very inexpensive if you consider the value of the points and miles. Location At the risk of stating the obvious, the hotel is easier to reach from SAW airport rather than IST airport, but it is still not that close to SAW. The ride in the taxi was about half an hour and cost 100 TRY. Room I saw online before arriving at the hotel that I was upgraded to an executive room rather than upgraded to a suite, which showed availability on Hilton.com. At check-in I was recognized as a Diamond member and told that I was upgraded to an executive room, confirming what I saw in my account online. Then the lady asked us if it was our first time “here” to which I responded that it was our first time in this hotel but that we stayed at Hilton Istanbul Bomonti before. After that she looked further and upgraded us to a suite, which was great, but I wonder if I had said it was our first time ever in Istanbul perhaps no suite upgrade for us! I was generally pleased with the room particularly given the price. Immediately upon entering the room there is a small counter with sink, microwave, and mini-fridge. On the other side there is a half bathroom, which I always appreciate having in a suite. The living room is relatively small and strangely there is no chair next to the working desk. The living room is separated from the bedroom by a sliding door so it’s a proper suite and given that there is a sofa bed in the living room you can sleep 4 people in the room with some privacy. The furniture is a bit tired but not too horrible. There is an international electric power plug next to the working desk and a USB connection, but the USB was not working. The bedroom is also on the small side and the electric power plugs on each side of the bed were not international, unlike in the living room. There is a large closet in the bedroom and the way the doors open must have puzzled a few guests because you can see it’s been forced. The two large doors do not open like regular closet doors open: each door can be opened by sliding the door on top of the other door after tilting it at an angle first. Both the bedroom and living room have wood floors which makes the room feel cleaner than it would be with carpets. The main bathroom is nice with a large bathtub + rain shower area. However the water pressure in the rain shower was so low that I would not even call it water “pressure”. You can literally see individual drops of water quickly falling from the shower head rather than having a steady flow of water. I had to use the hose instead. Overall I was pleased to get a suite upgrade, the extra space is nice, but this is not a luxury room by Istanbul standards and Hilton Bomonti is far better. However consider the price (Hilton Bomonti = 2x Hilton Kozyatagi), and consider that you might have lower odds of a suite upgrade at Hilton Bomonti. Dining The executive lounge is ok but not great, and has some tables on the terrace outside. Happy hour is 6-8pm and had a decent spread and particularly with desserts. I found that the lounge was not crowded and quite pleasant. Unfortunately the food was not replenished a single time so after 7pm there was not much food left and by 8pm when staff arrived to remove trays and bowls, they were almost all empty. If I had arrived after 7pm I would have been disappointed, and I can only imagine the situation if the lounge had been crowded – perhaps they start to run out after only 30 minutes? For alcohol they had one red wine, one white wine, and one rosé wine, all of them from Turkey. They also had beer and vodka. Overall the lounge in Kozyatagi is inferior to Hilton Bomonti where the lounge is the strength of that hotel, but once again keep the price tag in mind. For breakfast we like the quiet environment of a lounge, but we also like the wider spread of a hotel restaurant. As Diamond we had the choice where to go, and we first went to the lounge to see what choice was available (before deciding if we go to the restaurant instead) and we were pleased to see reasonable variety so we stayed in the lounge for breakfast. We arrived after 10am so it was the tail end of breakfast time, but unlike for happy hour there were no empty trays of something not restocked by staff. Everything was still available in decent quantities. Service We did not stay in the hotel very long so I cannot have strong feelings either way about service, however I would note that reception staff and lounge staff were generally pleasant. In addition the morning of departure we were proactively offered a 2pm late check-out, which is a nice change from some other Hilton properties which can tend to rush us out the door with a more stingy check-out time policy, in contrast with the more generous treatment at Starwood and Hyatt hotels. Overall Overall not a bad hotel and good value for the money if you set your expectations accordingly with the price. It is not fair to compare this hotel with the more expensive and luxurious hotels on the European side of town – I think a more fair comparison would be with the Marriott Istanbul Asia which is not far from Hilton Kozyatagi. I have not tried the Marriott yet but I would be curious to see how they stack up because they are in a similar price range.
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