flyer4512

Has anybody stayed here before a flight ? It seems like they have their own security checkpoint if you only have carry on bags. If you have checked bags they have a shuttle that runs 24 x 7 to the terminal

This seems kind of odd, why not just have the hotel connect to the airline check in at Terminal 1 then you could just walk and check your bags ?

I was wondering if we might be able to check bags the night before ( say around 6pm) for a 5 am departure.

Anyway, we are going to stay here the night before flight in March,

https://www.ihg.com/intercontinental...ha/hoteldetail


EDIT .............Read the terrible and poor reviews . It's a new hotel so hopefully these bugs are worked out and we will book the shuttle giving us plenty of time just in case

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Re...Minnesota.html

Hawkeyefan

flyer4512

Reading reviews it seems the TSA check at the hotel has odd ( random) hours and never opened before 5:30 am even before the shutdown.

The reviews about people missing flights because of shuttle issues is a major concern of mine as the reason we are staying here is because we have a 5 am departure.

Even if we could check bags for our flight the night before we would still need the shuttle as the TSA checkpoint won't be open at ~4am

I haven't stay here yet so I'll reserve judgement but I have to wonder why this hotel is not set up like most on site hotels where you can walk with all your bags to the Airline check in and then go through TSA just as if you were dropped off at the airport. If the shuttle only holds ten people, all with checked bags in seems like a bad plan doomed to fail as people miss flights.

I'm guessing the shuttle also goes to terminal 2 so even more delays.

I also read reviews saying the airport access back to the hotel has been closed in the early evening.

Hopefully the learning curve has passed but I will be following the TripAdvisor reviews and maybe some reports here before I book

db1234db1234

Stayed here last week and loved the hotel. I had carry on bags only and used the walkway from the post security area of the terminal to the hotel. Note, if you have checked baggage, you have to go to the baggage carousels, pick up your bags, then take the shuttle to the hotel. Can’t walk straight to the hotel as the hotel connects you to the post security area of T1. It’s still not bad but the shuttles do get busy. I see they have 2 shuttles although only one was in service last week. They take reservations upon checkin now so I guess it depends if they need to run 2 shuttles. Each shuttle holds about 8 to 10 people.

The hotel itself is beautiful. I loved the Peloton bike in the fitness room where you can take live classes or on demand classes. The restaurants are also very good and very reasonably priced for an IC at the airport.

Hawkeyefan

Bump.

Read IC MSP's Facebook page today...looks like TSA is shutting down the skyway checkpoint as of today Nov 18. You can still ENTER the hotel from the skyway, but can no longer clear security INTO the terminal there. Very, very disappointing. Used once was going to use again early 2020. May now just stay at a different hotel altogether.

FlyinHawaiian

June 2022 Update - the TSA skyway checkkpoint to the hotel is still closed; details of my stay are posted here: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/34347655-post31.html

JAXPax

I stayed at this hotel last week. I reserved a standard King (or Classic King whatever they term it) and as IHG Platinum I was upgraded to a Premium Runway View King which would have been nice if there during daylight. The only way I knew I received an upgrade was seeing the room type change in the app. Room was nice, clean, seemed newer than it is. Good soundproofing. I was on the 9th floor facing toward the end of G concourse.

TSA still closed but the skywalk to get from C25 to the hotel is open one way. It was nice to walk from my inbound flight from Bemidji at A2, and literally see the hotel as I exited the jetway, and be standing at the check-in desk 5 minutes later.

Check-in was very abrupt. "ID and credit card" was my response to Good Evening, I'm checking in. I was thanked for being a Platinum and asked if I wanted points or a drink voucher for the bar. I said I don't drink alcohol, but I would take a bottle of water or two (she had a case of water on the counter next to her). She said sorry, but she will have to give me points. She was happy to charge me for two bottles of water from the closed coffee stand across. No asking if I had stayed before, no introduction to any amenities of the hotel, just pointed toward the elevators. I did stop and step back and ask about airport shuttle in the morning and got a "What time?" I knew from reading online it ran on the 20's and requested a 0620 shuttle. Overall disappointing.

Ate at the lobby restaurant (the steakhouse/sports bar one) sitting at the bar. Pretty good burger. Bartender/server named Bob was great, very friendly and the right amount of talkative, addressing everybody by name. Seemed he had some regular guests who ate there every night of the stay.

Shuttle in the morning was a great experience. I exited the elevator into the lobby and the driver was standing there and addressed me by name, said I was the only one with a reservation but we needed to wait a couple of minutes until the scheduled time. Asked which terminal/airline. I said that Delta was close enough to where I was going. He asked specifically where and I said I was taking ground transport on Groome over to Eau Claire. He said he would do one better than Delta and drove me directly to the Groome pick-up area and let me off about 20 feet from their desk and told me their check-in procedures. I wrote in a nice note about him. He even offered to get out and show me where to go but I could see it through the window.

I'll probably stay again depending on price. Corporate discount got me about $200/night after tax. I'd put the convenience value as $20-30 for a one-night stay, which won out over the Crowne Plaza which was my alternative.

My hotel the next night was actually my best hotel stay in awhile.... at the C'Mon Inn in Thief River Falls. (Yes, I had a whole Minnesota/Wisconsin week and I'm trying to shake the accent. I grew up in Omaha with a little bit of it... I speak enough Minnesotan to know that Not too bad is about as good as you'll get and Not too good is really bad.)

willoL

I stayed at the InterContinental Minneapolis on Memorial Day 2023. We were a party of two, mother and teen son returning home after a weekend at camp in Northern MN. (Is there a rule that you must be returning from Bemidji to stay here?)

We arrived before dropping off a rental car. DS wanted to be left at the hotel to relax, so I pulled up, checked with the valet that it was okay to leave the rental car in the driveway for a few minutes, and stepped up to the desk. I'd checked in when an email prompted me to do so using the app. That was an error because I had intended to pay with a different card when a Merchant Offer for hotels popped up on my Citi card. The gentleman at the front desk took the alternate card to use for incidentals, but I didn't push to see if my check in could be rescinded. It's worth noting the my original card was ALSO charged for incidentals, so adding the Citi card was actually a failure.

The man at the front desk was courteous, polite, and I thought he was doing a great job when I checked in. I'm only Silver Elite (post-pandemic), and not an Ambassador, but he offered me two bottles of water for myself and my teen which I declined as I dislike wasting disposables. I asked about a shuttle pickup after I returned the rental car, and he explained what to do (i.e., call from the hotel pick up area after completing car return.)

My teen went up to the room with our luggage using their lobby luggage cart, and I returned the car to Budget at Terminal 2. I felt like I was on private service roads driving between the IC MSP and Terminal 2 car rental return, but I think I was allowed to drive there. There was a route that didn't include any highway time anyway, and I hardly saw another vehicle navigating it. Returning the rental was trivial and easy, and the shuttle van came to get me within a few minutes of my calling to request the pick up.

Shuttle drivers at this hotel are particularly great, in my opinion. Two different men were friendly, helpful, assisted with bags, answered questions, and proactively tried to assist a traveler at an unfamiliar airport. All the staff at the IC MSP seemed very good, especially by 2023 standards, but the shuttle guys were the best I encountered.

I was really tired after the long drive in a strange car on a holiday weekend, so my son and I ate dinner on site at the La Voya Brasserie. (My teen enjoyed calling it "the brassičre" sotto voce to annoy his mother.) The dinner menu differed somewhat from what is shown today on the hotel website. My son had the burger, minus a few of the fancier accompaniments from the La Voya menu (he ordered a Bradstreet Burger as prepared in the adjacent Bradstreet Crafthous and that was no problem for the kitchen.) I had the duck entree served with lentils. My son ordered an almond cake accompanied by mushroom(!) ice cream and plums, and he gave me a taste. The unusual ice cream flavor was actually magnificent.

Overall, the food quality was very high. Service was also excellent. I believe our server was named Rebecca, and she was knowledgeable (could recommend a wine and comment generally on the wine list), friendly, and great at her job. There were only a few people dining, and I believe she was the only server working, but there always seemed to be an additional person on duty at the bar who would seat people if Rebecca was in the kitchen or otherwise occupied.

We did not visit the Bradstreet Crafthouse or the Coffee Shop in the lobby. It's possible that the espresso I ordered in La Voya came from the Coffee Shop machine, but I wasn't watching to see from which direction my server came to deliver it to the table. (The espresso was fine.)

At breakfast the next morning, I returned to dine in La Voya while my son slept late. I enjoyed my omelet (the one from the menu, no changes), but I wouldn't order the biscuits again. They tasted good, but were more crumbly like a savory scone than the flaky Southern style of biscuit I'd hoped for. A different woman was server at breakfast, but I didn't catch her name. Again, I think two people were working the very quiet restaurant. It was no problem when I asked for a breakfast sandwich to go for my son. Again, he didn't want the fairly elaborate La Voya breakfast sandwich, but it was not a problem to get a simple egg and cheese on sourdough for him. The takeaway included utensil packet, ketchup packets, etc., without my having to ask for those things.

Aside from dining in the hotel and using the shuttle, we found the elevators to be adequate and to arrive quickly. The lobby was spacious and a reasonable place to wait a few minutes for a shuttle. Our room was pleasant, attractive, and had a wonderful view of the airport and planes taking off from Terminal 1. My son grumbled because we had to share a King bed, but that was me not feeling any need to pay extra for a suite or two queens, not any fault of the hotel's.

Favorite aspects of the guest room itself were the separate tub (deep, no jets to accumulate crud) and shower stall, the many lighting options including a blue bathroom nightlight and illuminated make up mirror for very soft bathroom light, and the comfortable bed. I personally didn't like the closet position adjacent to the bed instead of across from it, but we hardly needed the closet on a single night stay. My son wished for a sofa instead of just one desk chair in the room. I asked if a tea kettle could be had instead of the Nespresso machine, but they did not have one. (Black tea is ideally brewed at 205 F, not coffee machine temps.)

My biggest gripe was the presence of paper and plastic disposable cups in the room. At this price point, and with a full kitchen downstairs, I expect real ceramic (or glass or porcelain) drinkware. I was able to bring a nightcap upstairs from the restaurant, so could have asked for a coffee mug, too, I guess, but I despise a default disposable where anything else is easily possible. Fortunately, I travel with my own reusable hot cup, so I used that with the Nespresso machine.

I would use this hotel again, depending upon cost, but would only prioritize it if I were arriving late, carry on only (no checked bag) and into Terminal 1. Otherwise, our stay at a nearby Hyatt with its own shuttle was just as convenient for a JetBlue flight from Terminal 2, and I think I might find another full service hotel where I could get a tea kettle and proper coffee cup in my room as I prefer.

GUWonder

How is the Diamond Ambassador breakfast working out at the IC MSP?

@willoL , seems like he imbibed the spirit of the Concordia French language camp. [Back when I used to be around there, sometimes the only way to get cleaned up from head to toe was to go bathe in the lake and use soap and shampoo in the lake. And then we would sometimes have bears come around to the lake and have to go shelter in the cabins. For some of us city-slickers, getting to a hotel in MSP was a chance to have a nice shower to recover after expanding our foreign language vocabulary and missing nice showers. Glad to know this place has come to be that place. ]

jules1651

Was thinking of booking with a four hour layover (long travel day with easily overwhelmed child) -- how much time would I need to give myself to re-enter security midday on a Thursday? Trying to decide if worth it (if they even do 2-3 hour blocks like other transit hotels).

flyer4512

We are giving IHG at MSP a shot this Friday as we have a 7am departure on Delta the following day.

If this works out we have several other night before our flight stays already booked.

We plan on parking at EZ air park vs paying $40 a day and being squeezed in a tight airport parking spot.

I'm not sure if we can walk to he hotel from the T1 drop-off , it seems there may be a way but since we aren't sure how to get to the hotel from T1 while staying inside we'll probably just call the hotel for a shuttle when we are dropped off at T1.

After we check in we can see if we could have accessed T1 from where EZ air park drops off without going outside or even outside on a sidewalk.

Too bad this hotel doesn't have direct access like Marriott at TPA where you can walk from your room with your bags to security.

JAXPax

There is a way to walk but you have to go outside for at least the last portion.

You can exit the secure area into the hotel but the security checkpoint to go directly from the hotel into the concourse has been closed for years due to TSA staffing.

flyer4512

We would be walking from the T1 drop off to the hotel

I have scoped it more than a few times as the Ez air shuttle dropped us off at T1 but I don't think it's something I want to learn the first time while dragging 2 bags each with us.

After we check in I may take a walk to T1 and check it out,

Thanks