Putra

Website : http://doubletree3.hilton.com/en/hot...IDI/index.html

gummibar

I just checked and they are accepting reservation from 4 May onwards....so i guess you have no problem staying there on the 10th.

Do come back with a review with photos! I'm kinda excited to hear about this new hotel!

Jaimito Cartero

I stayed at this property over the weekend. I had booked the Presidential Suite during their great sale earlier in the year, and was disappointed that it wouldn't be open when I was going to stay.



The general manager did contact me a few weeks in advance, letting me know that the suite wouldn't be ready for my arrival, after a bit of back and forth, he made me an offer I couldn't refuse.



The property is located near the Cikini train station in the central part of Jakarta. I think the property used to house student dormitories at the University of Indonesia. There are still other universities in the area. You can see them pretty clearly from the pool area.



I was contacted the day before my arrival by the front office manager and asked about some details for the rooms I was getting. I got their King Deluxe Suite and King Superior suites. There is not much difference between the two, but the Deluxe suite has a large balcony area. This seems to be included in the area listed for the suite, so the Superior has more actual interior space.



These two suites both have part of the living room overhanging the building, a bit of an architectural feature. About 10 feet or so. You won't really notice it at all.



I found the living room nicely done, with a comfortable couch in a L formation. Nice computer desk and chair. There is a capsule coffee/tea machine, but no capsules that I could find.



The suites are almost identical, so pictures will be a mixture of the two rooms.



Here's the King bedroom. Nice, comfortable beds, and great pillows. Has a nice padded bench, too.



The bathroom is quite nice. It has a double sink, with lighted makeup mirror. Plus a nice tub, with wand sprayer (although I could never figure out how to turn the sprayer on). It has a nice sized shower, with built in bench, and wand shower head, plus rain shower head. Plenty of nice hot water, too.



It has a toilet, with frosted glass door. It has a standard spray handle stored on the right hand side. The pressure for this one seemed a bit weak. Nice fluffy towels here, too. Bathroom amenities are Crabtree and Evelyn.



It has a pretty standard small closet/cabinet. It has an ironing board, smallish safe, hangers, and a couple of drawers. Bathrobes and an ironing board, too. There is also a baggage storage platform next to it.

Jaimito Cartero

The restaurant is on the ground floor, next to the pool. You can go down the escalator from the lobby, or take the elevator.



We ate breakfast at the Open restaurant every day, plus had a dinner brunch one night. It's a pretty big restaurant, although we never saw it more than 40% full, as the hotel wasn't even close to being fully occupied.

Breakfast was complimentary for our booking. I don't know what it normally costs, but in Jakarta in general, 150K-180k (plus tax and service) is pretty average.



There are a number of hot stations for breakfast. Eggs, Asian specialties, noodles, etc. There is also a separate island that has breads, juices and some other items.



If you want to get all the food items, you will do an almost complete walk around the restaurant, but it's not bad.



The lunch buffet was 258K++, and dinner was 288++.

It was a couple of days before my birthday, so I had a nice dinner here with my family. The prepared food options were pretty good, but the specialty grill, pasta station, and satay station were much preferred.

They had some nice petite ribeye steaks (and I do mean petite, maybe 40-50 grams each), and they're happy to make you a few of them. The grilled chicken breast was very good, too. They had a choice of of chicken, beef or shrimp satays. I got a couple of each to try them out. The beef ones were super tough, which I mentioned to one of the managers who came to check on us. 5 minutes later, they brought me some more that were much better. The chicken and shrimp were great.



When we were here, buffet dinners came with one complimentary glass of house wine or beer.

Excellent service from the staff, and we found the food to be pretty good. I was a bit surprised that the food and service was this good, in the first month they were open.

Jaimito Cartero

The pool is one of my favorite areas at the hotel. It's quite large, and easy to swim laps. It has wood decking in many areas. It's an infinity type edged pool. Located on the ground floor.



It varies from 1 meter to 1.4 meters in depth. One great feature I rarely find in Indonesia, is that it has steps and railings for the pool. No flimsy metal ladders here. It has a bar on the center island, although it's not open.

There is also a separate kids pool with a depth of .5 meter. There is a kids play center right next to it, but it currently is closed. Again, this pool has nice steps/railings, too.

There are some tables outside the Open restaurant, but unfortunately no normal sit down tables around the pool. They only have very low loungers with a table between them.



There is a small, but nice gym there, also. Note, you need your key card to exit the pool area, unless you exit through the restaurant.

camsean

Pics look great. Cikini is one the nicest areas of Jakarta as well.

Jaimito Cartero

Cikini is certainly a mixed bag. There are a number of very basic type houses in the area. I wouldn't quite call it a slum, but my wife actually lived in the neighborhood as a child, and they wanted to move to a better area.

The trains can be pretty noisy, luckily the hotel rooms seemed to have pretty good sound proofing.

Putra

Nice report^

Executive Lounge open? The capsule was there during my time.

Jaimito Cartero

No, they're still working on the Exec Lounge. Seems to be at least a month or two out. No capsules that I could see. It wasn't too big of an issue, or I would have just called. I don't drink coffee, but my wife would probably like tea if they had it. I only checked in our room, and not the second one.

HerpaYvr

Nice summary, my buddy and I will be there in October, what is the best way to get there from the airport?

Jaimito Cartero

Taxis are in plentiful supply, although there maybe a 5-15 minute wait for reputable ones at busy times. If you want luxury, you can take Silverbird. Normal recommended companies are Blue Bird, Express, Gamya or TaxiKu. The latter having some smaller Chevy taxis that are a bit cramped. Their Toyota ones are fine.

There are scammer taxis are also plentiful, so be careful of touts.

Prices will be $10-15 in local currency. For Silverbird, 50% extra. Traffic in Jakarta can be horrid, stick to the tollway for the majority of the trip.

Have a good trip, and don't forget to write a report.

Jaimito Cartero

Has anyone actually stayed in the Presidential Suite yet?

aztimm

How far is the property from the airport?
I'm looking at a possible MR to Jakarta, and the flight gets in at 1am. I'm assuming taxi would be the best option? About how much would that cost?

Is there much to do/explore close to the hotel?

The prices do look rather reasonable.

skaya

No, its not finished, and is scheduled for some date in November.

Jaimito Cartero

The hotel is a reasonable enough location in itself. Taxis are cheap, $12-$14 for a standard taxi, or 50% more for a Silverbird baby Mercedes or similar from the airport during nonbusy times.

Taxis to other locations nearby are quite cheap $3-5 usually.

There is currently a Hilton sale, with prepaid rates as low as $59++ (about $70-72 with tax/svc) on some nights.