Chris Mastramico

Review of Capital Skyline Hotel

This hotel is fairly well worn and a bit dated, bu...

This hotel is fairly well worn and a bit dated, but in a charming way. Little details that a name brand would be all over seem like they can go unnoticed here. One example, the safe in my room was broken, but easily fixable. I'm sure a call to the desk would have taken care of that, but I didn't travel with the my expensive heirlooms on this trip, so I didn't think to prompt that action. Or, the shower drain was just a bit slow, which would also be easily fixable. Again, not painful enough to act on. I noticed a few minor details like that in my short stay but they didn't make a difference, one way or the other.

Overall, the rooms are big and the beds comfortable. The pool and pool area is really quite nice (my kids lasted 90 minutes in one of the Smithsonian's before asking to go back to the pool). It has a bit of a resort vibe to it.

The food and drink selection and quality at the Morris Lounge wasn't bad, although it wasn't especially good. The breakfast buffet, in the Lapidus restaurant, however, was pretty good.

One thing that caught me was how the room rate was presented on the various hotel search websites. Where they market the rate at a massive discount (in my case, 65%+), you're really just getting the going rate. As I was checking in, someone walked in off the street, asked a clerk if they had any vacant rooms, and was immediately presented a rate that was within a few bucks off my 'highly discounted' rate. That's probably the way it goes at virtually every hotel, but that was the first time in all my travels that I had it spelled out in those specific terms. To be fair, I don't read the fine print, or most of the large print, on those sites, so maybe my expectation is off. Whatever the case, the room rate was better than most in the area, and turned out to be a good value.

Overall, it was a good experience and I'd go back again.