Holiday Inn East Century City, Chengdu, China
The Eastern Tibetan Plateau trip ended in Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province, with a population of over 11 million people and a very important economic center. Did you know that Chengdu was the birthplace of the first widely used paper money in the world? We stayed in the center of Chengdu on previous trips, and did a little sightseeing, of which the most important was the Giant Panda Breeding Center, an absolute must see. How can anyone not love watching those adorable pandas!
This time, we selected the Holiday Inn East Century City, south of main Chengdu, in the Chengdu convention center area, around 30 minutes from the center. We chose this area because summers are hot, we'd been here, done it and were only staying for two nights before flying home. However, the Holiday Inn also runs a bus into Chengdu center three times a day or you could take a taxi or public bus in. The public bus stops in front and the Holiday Inn will be happy to give you directions.
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There are three hotels in the East Century City complex. The Holiday Inn East and West (two different hotels, half block apart), and Intercontinental, all part of the Intercontinental Hotel Group. All three hotels have different rates and amenities but with a common thread running through them. You certainly couldn't ask for more helpful people, even if their English was a little on the "I've just learned English side..." If you stood in the lobby for more than two seconds, staff would approach and ask if there is anything they could do for you. For example, ex-Marine asked the front desk for a newspaper as we were leaving the hotel for a walk and requested they just leave it in the room. We had barely gotten one-half block away from the hotel when one of the staff ran after us, newspaper in hand. That is great service at a Bed and Breakfast rate of less than $100 a night including all service and taxes.
A spacious bedroom...View image, beautiful bathroom...View image, delicious and expansive breakfast buffets... and, yes...this is a picture of a vacuum cleaner and...clean carpet....View image After spending a total of six nights in two 4**** hotels where vacuum cleaners and brooms were non-existant, I wanted to hug it.
If you want to step up to even more luxury, stay at the Intercontinental across the street. The inside atrium lobby is incredibly beautiful with a restaurant in the center surrounded by gardens and a multi-story Chinese tea house built into one wall. What a gorgeous hotel. All three hotels have restaurants that serve huge breakfast...View image, lunch and dinner buffets (they change daily) besides a la carte restaurants. Mongolian Hot Pot, Chinese, Japanese, French food, and even pizza. Not only that, an art exhibition called the "China Narratives" was being held next door in the convention center and all guests in these three hotels were being admitted free. That's on the agenda for tomorrow.
Don't gratuitously eliminate hotels that go by the name of Day's Inn, Holiday Inn, Best Western from your searches while looking for hotels worldwide. I'm all for small hotels owned by the local people but there are times that only clean carpets, breakfasts that include American food, fluffy duvets and CNN will do, and this was one of them. Remember, Holiday Inn East Century City in Chengdu.
