frenchft

I see. Differents expectations : I don't really care about breakfast and lounge but I care about upgrade and pool area + location.
Miss frenchft went to breakfast restaurant one morning and reported me the zoo stuff too, but till they upgrade me well, I'm happy with the property. Again, based on what I value first.

And not to mention that I much prefer to do my business meeting at Conrad than MH, don't know why but sounds more professional, less "holidays hotel". Important point to me to get some quiet space in the lobby without flip flop tourist everywhere for having my meetings.

escape4

For sure if a business meeting was my purpose then Conrad is the choice. The environment is more serious, professional, and on point.

There is a greater proportion of vacationers at MH than Conrad without a doubt.

Location of Conrad is also better for business, and MH for leisure + visiting temples by boat.

frenchft

Anyone tried the new Waldorf?

:D!

Waldorf Astoria Bangkok {THA}

thbe

Yes. It's excellent.

I'm not surprised about the different views towards MH and Conrand. They are both very different. Conrad is 5 star business hotel and MH is a 4,5 star tourist hotel. The new WA is a 5,5 star posh hotel.

Good to have different choices. Everyone can pick what he likes.

Btw: The breakfast at the Conrad is really good and much better than the breakfast at MH. I never saw it really crowded. But I use to stay in my home time, so if I have breakfast staying in BKK, I take it before I go to bed - at 6:30am. ;-)

escape4

We returned to Millenium Hilton and this time booked the "old" panoramic suite = not renovated. You can compare the pictures with what I posted 2 months ago. The old room is tired and needs touch-up paint especially on darker spots in the bathrooms, and the furniture is well past its prime, but I did not mind all that much. I prefer the layout and luminosity of the living room in the old room and I like that there is no wasted space which is the case in the renovated rooms. I am not keen on paying a price premium for rooms I like less, which will be the case once all rooms are renovated and I can no longer book the old rooms. Oh well.

eddibabyyeah

Opposite experience for me. I did 2 stays there last month. The first time I booked a standard room and got a standard room for one night, No upgrade. My second stay I booked exec room for two nights and got the exec. Again, no upgrade. I am diamond and have stayed at this property more than a dozen times.

I did get one of the newly refurbished exec rooms, which was rather nice.

The point regarding transportation. I believe that the hotel will soon have a MRT link from BTS Krung Thonburi. This will be the start of the MRT goldline. Not sure when completion will be, but I was told its about a year or two away. The idea of this is to link BTS to ICONSIAM which is being built next door.

sapguy

I was told that there is a possibility of buying the discounted Diamond panoramic suite upgrade of 1k THB at the Millennium Hilton Bangkok.

Could someone please tell me how this would work? Can I arrange for the purchase of the suite upgrade in advance or it's done at check-in?

Also, we have a 7:30AM flight to Tokyo on the day of departure so I would appreciate any input on transportation to the airport - does the hotel has a car that we can hire or it will be taxi? Thanks

ExpatSomchai

On the transport side if you want to pay extortionate rates use the hotel service. Taxis's at that time personally I would not. My preference would be to book an AOT limo.

FlytheTail

I've taken a taxi from the hotel twice, once early in the morning, another mid-morning, and had good experiences. Rates were normal meter fares and there were no attempts to settle on a fixed price.

MrLee

Hi all,

I stayed at the DT Sukhumvit in August and don't have any major complaints, however I'll be in Bangkok again for 5 nights in December and I'm considering the MH to be in a different part of the city. Points wise it's 20k for the DT and 27k for the MH, so I would like to justify the extra points if staying by the river.

Please can you let me have your thoughts on the area compared to the location of the DT? When you take the temples and shrines out of the equation, is there much left to explore, see and do on foot? Granted the DT didn't seem to have too much to discover on foot, but things never seemed to be too far away when getting a Grab bike. I just don't want to find myself getting bikes back over that way after exploring what's on foot by the hotel after a day or two!

Thank you

sbams

The location of the Millenium Hilton is in my opinion far better, but there have been thousands of posts on this subject and opinions vary. There is so much to do and see along the river, from Asiatique at one end (the MH runs a free shuttle boat) all the way op to Nonthaburi, and everything in between. The cross river hotel shuttle is perfect and drops you off right where the Chao Phrya Express (Orange Flag!) leaves.

And apart from that, as a Diamond you have access to a solid lounge for breakfast, afternoon tea and happy hour. Not the best in the world but certainly very pleasant with lovely views.

Enjoy!

xyhoo

Is there a chance to be upgraded from the Family Suite to Executive ones as a Gold Member (2 adults and 2 kids) ? Does that Family Suite definitely have no river view?

escape4

They have recently changed the names of the rooms and I am more familiar with the panoramic suites xx01 and xx02 which are on the river side of the building, rather than the xx27 and xx28 suites which are on the city side of the building, so please do not take my comments as gospel.

Suites xx27 and xx28 are mostly city views but the river is not a straight line so you can see the river at a distance if you look on the side.

Golds get a 1-category upgrade upon availability and Diamonds get a 2-category upgrade upon availability. So if you are Gold and book the Family Suite, I think technically they will upgrade you to what they now call "king river view suite" which I believe is the city side, but the difference with the family suite is that it allows lounge access. If you book the river view suite, you will possibly be upgraded to the panoramic suite, which gives lounge access, river side (xx01 or xx02), but unrenovated. The highest category above that being panoramic executive: renovated, river side, and lounge access.

Amelorn

Review
Dates: 21 Aug to 26 August
Rate: 108,000 points for the stay
Room: Standard (booked); Exec King (received)

am fond of the Millennium Hilton (MH). Rates are quite affordable, the views from the lounge are excellent, and it’s in an ideal location for most Bangkok tourists. Diamond treatment has historically been generous re: suite upgrades. Sadly, I didn’t luck out, as the hotel sold out several days prior to arrival. For reasons unexplained, a great deal of upper-end hotel inventory throughout Bangkok sold out for the week that I was in town. I was limited to the statutory exec floor upgrade (I booked a standard king room, as usual). Unusually, the staff were pro-actively apologetic.



I was given a recently renovated room on an Executive-level floor. The espresso machine and rainfall shower were appreciated.

Pool & Gym

The pool area tries to mimic a beach experience with large sheltered beds/couches (great for a couple) and setting sun loungers in a few inches of shallow water. The pool itself is significantly sheltered from overhead. This is often polarizing on Tripadvisor reviews, as some think the water would be a bit warmer if exposed to sun. As a very pale ginger, I appreciated being able to swim in the shade and not increase my skin cancer risk. For those keen to light money on fire, two staff are on hand to fix you up with a US$10 fruit plate, $5 coffee, or a $6 beer served poolside.


One could say that the pool is dated in comparison with more contemporary infinity pool designs in this market segment, but I was happy with the comfortable furniture options (table & chairs, sun loungers, bean bag seating, and cabanas)

The adjacent gym is expansive with free weights, resistance machines, and numerous cardio machines. A separate area downstairs is an open studio room if you need space for another routine (e.g. yoga, stretching, etc). Spa quality locker-rooms offer large a jacuzzi tub as well as dry-sauna and steam rooms in the men’s and women’s locker rooms. The facilities were in an immaculate state of repair, spotlessly clean, and spacious. I developed a great morning routine of setting the treadmill to show me courses of New Zealand before hitting the dry sauna

Dining/Exec Lounge

EL: The crown jewel of the property, the exec lounge view over Bangkok tends to wow visitors. The other guests found the view addicting, and guests often took full advantage of breakfast, afternoon tea, and evening cocktail services.



As a diamond, I could take breakfast in the lounge or main restaurant, or both – if you wished to indulge your inner hobbit. The exec lounge spread included veggie and tamago/egg sushi, smoked meats and seafood (mackerel & salmon), eggs cooked to order + egg of the day, miso soup, Chinese-style fried rice, steamed dim sum (custard bao and red bean bao), sausage & bacon, breads, and various patisserie treats. (Note: the Asian breakfast items slant heavily Chinese, likely to accommodate the exploding number of Chinese tourists heading to Thailand)

Afternoon tea: The lounge sourced its treats from the hotel’s main restaurant and Chinese restaurant. I found the scones to be quite good. I appreciated the decent quality (probably imported) jam and cream. Savory items include various rotating sandwiches (chicken salad, egg salad, cheese, salmon & cream cheese, etc) curry puffs, and quiches appeared. Asian fusion cakes such as mango mousse and yuzu were present, in addition to Cantonese mango pudding (kudos to the onsite Chinese restaurant).

Cocktail Hour: I noticed that since my last visit, the hotel switched a major beverage contract to Singha. In the past, I had Chang here. I prefer Singha. Also, the spirits in the cocktails have been upgraded from well to mid-shelf (e.g. Absolut for vodka cocktails). The wine won’t wow you, but the Chilean red was a very pleasant drink.

Flow is the MH’s main restaurant offering buffet or a la carte options. I opted to do the buffet dinner for two nights, though I had an ace up my sleeve. Eatigo is a restaurant booking app in SE Asia and Hong Kong that allows diners to snag up to 50% off depending on the time they book. The app requires all participating restaurants to offer at least one time slot per day at the 50% off rate. Thanks to this, I enjoyed two excellent dinners with sushi, oysters, and an amazing dessert bar for US$24 and earned Honors points, as I billed the dinner to my room.


I ended up doing this on Tuesday when I arrived (incidentally would have been my late mother’s 60th birthday) and on Saturday night.


Some dinner highlights: delicious salmon, butterfish, and tamago/egg nigiri sushi, butterfish & Hamachi sashimi, decadent mango prawn curry & other thai delights, and all-you-can-gorge mango sticky rice. Cheese lovers will likely enjoy being unleashed in the adjoining cheese room, featuring cheesy temptations from around the world. Overall, I noted a raw bar (prawn/oysters), Thai, Japanese (sushi, sashimi, tempura), Indian, Western/European, dessert (western & Thai + ice cream & mango sticky rice), and the cheese room.

Yuan: Not wanting to leave you, dear reader, in the lurch, I opted one day to try out the Chinese restaurant’s dim sum a la carte buffet. Once again, I eatigo’ed myself a 50% discount. The format: they give you a menu. You order whatever you want to your heart’s content. Beyond the standard fare of har gau (shrimp dumplings) and char siu bao (Cantonese BBQ pork buns), I decided to indulge in mango crab spring rolls, foie gras xiaolongbao (soup dumplings), and lobster dumplings with gold leaf. To wash it down, I had a couple of pots of chrysanthemum tea (teas/soda are included). This meal went down as one of my best $18 (circa THB600) ever spent.


Summary: Quite happy with the property. A suite upgrade would have been nice, but the hotel was showing up as completely sold out 5 days before I arrived, so I didn't expect it. Eatigo worked wonderfully. I hope to be back soon.

Pictures, a more detailed account, and a video room walk-through available on my website.