Ok hotel with ok location

I booked this property with points as in current times, prices are crazy at these sort of prime tourist location spot even outside of major holiday seasons and during the weekday.  Stayed here for 1 night as I had never visited the area before and just wanted to check out what the excitment was about of the californian wine country was all about. 

The property is located in what seems like a sort of own private terrain with it's golf course - and what can you say when the road leading to the hotel is named Doubletree Drive.  There's really not much around the area within walking distance except for a few shots at the turn of the drive.  Outside of that from here, it's a short drive to the nearby small villages and different vineyards and properties.  

For a leisure walk surrounded by greens, this would be the perfect place as there's not much traffic and lots of greeneries. 

I did receive an email about my upgrade to a King Deluxe room with Balcony a few days before arrival, which was a nice touch.  Based on this I was going into the property actually with some nice hope and expectations.  I arrived at the property just after 4pm and although the lobby area/public area was busy (a group seemed to have just returned from their days trip around visitng different wine houses) - I was helped immediately by a front desk agent that just became free.  

I was welcomed and thanked for my loyalty - and outside of that given the explanation of the daily credit.  I was also asked if I had a car and was told that parking would be 15$ per day - which I was actually quite surprised since it was an out of city property and by the looks of it, not too busy that day.  I did complain about this charge (above the asking price of the room that day - yes I paid with points, but imagine paying the high price, and yet have to pay for parking with a 30% occupied parking lot on a weekday).  I was also given the afamous Doubletree chocolate cookie (only received one although I did indicate 2 guests). 

The property has only 3 floors if I remember correctly and my room was located on the 2nd floor - strangely there's no other way (not that I discovered)  to access the 2nd floor besides the elevator.  The elevator itself was clearly showing the age of the property.  

This seems to be quite a large property, and my room was located after taking a few turns.  The room size was ok - although clearly the property has not be refreshed for quite some time.  Furnishing was still ok and seemed quite well maintained.  The room was a bit on the darker side despite having floor to ceiling windows - this is mainly due to the shade of the trees in front of the balcony. 

Other than that it was your typical Doubletree furnishing, with the long desk acting as the TV stand, working desk and coffee/tea making facilities.  There was a small seating aread close to the balcony.  The balcony was not really separated by walls from room to room, so one can walk to the next room without any separation.

Since the weather was on the cooler side, I switched off the climate control, and had the balcony door opened a bit in the night to keep the room cool.  Sleep quality was good - without any disturbance from either interior nor exterior.  The bed was still comfortable.

The bathroom was quite spacious with the usual bathtub - but again as reflected by the property on the old side.  Water pressure was ok, the same for temperature control.  

Breakfast was still not the usual, but every thing was made to order.  Since with the new policy of Hilton for elite members, I received a credit of $15 per person which basically is not much in current times with the increase in prices.  If one did not want to add their own to the bill, this credit will not get you much but just some some simple options.  For $13,  this got me one bagle and cream cheese and a small bowl of greek yoghurt and a cup of hot drink to go with it.  I found this to be terribly ridiculous in value (further the cream cheese was not even the original brand, but some generic one).  With tax added and tip, this actually still meant that I had to add some my own out of pocket expense.  

All in all, I found the stay especially from price point to be of terrible value.  These days everyone is using the pademic as an excuse to increase prices and delivery minimal service.  This property seems to be one in this same bucket.  If I had paid the asking rate of  > $200 per night without breakfast and parking included, I think my opinion of this property would have even been worst.  It is clear at this property the value to what you get for the price paid is just unbelievably poor.  The only good thing I can say about this property is during the check-out the front desk associate checking me out was one of the friendly one and understood the frustration and complains I had about the poor value for money.   As usual HHonors benefits were limited for elite members outside of that upgrade.