Stayed 4 nights at the Boston Harbor Hotel. It’s situated about 10 minutes from Boston South Station on the harbour and close to a lot of Boston’s top things to do. Being in this location has one negative thing and that is the road it’s on has some rather bad traffic at times. We probably spent 15 minutes getting to it from the train station and walking would have been quicker.
This isn’t really a big issue and to be expected at any place in prime locations so not really a fault of the hotel. We took a taxi in and out of here a few times and the traffic wasn’t too bad, was worst when we arrived which was on a Saturday so perhaps just gets bad in the weekend.
There’s a 7-Eleven less than 5 minutes walk away (north up the road) and there’s quite a few good restaurants within 5-10 minutes walk. Notably Pasta Beach and Legal Seafoods, both of which will probably require a booking for dinner after 630p.m. The Boston Aquarium is also a 5 minute walk and for kids there’s the Boston Children’s Museum (which is excellent) about 10 minutes walk, as is the Boston Tea Party. Bryant Park is 10 minutes away as is Faneuil Hall Marketplace and basically I don’t think you could stay at a better location than where Boston Harbor Hotel is.
Check in was fine at Boston Harbor Hotel, took a few minutes and no worries. The room is large and has a good view of the harbour, which itself is not great, but about as good as it gets for this area of the city. All the amenities were fine, nice bathroom, ok interiors and don’t think you’ll find much to complain in this department.
The beds are nice and comfortable, shower has a rain shower and normal shower, both of which are pretty good. Water temperature is constant and easy to adjust. Being the shower connoisseur I think I am, if I had one complaint, the water pressure could be a bit stronger but 99% of you normal people will be fine with it.
Staff here at Boston Harbor Hotel are excellent, all very friendly and professional. One member in particular, Christine, who you can usually find hanging out near the lobby or in front of the main entrance, is particularly helpful and will go out of her way to answer an questions or give you some advice on where to eat or what to do. There was a massive, massive difference between the staff here, and the staff at either hotel we stayed at in New York. (The Refinery Hotel and The Mark Hotel). This hotel has far superior service and the staff were much, much nicer.
Breakfast was good, nothing spectacular but better than average with a good selection including Eggs Benedict, Pancakes and pretty much most things you could want. They’ve got a kids menu which is also good, but the kids portions would feed anybody outside the USA quite comfortably.
We had one meal inside the hotel, I had Wiener Schnitzel, which was a big fat and rather tough piece of meat, and which I found rather bad. Grobbler had a cheese pizza, which was chock full of cheese. I didn’t particularly like it, but Grobbler scoffed it down and I’ve never seen him eat so much pizza. Even though I didn’t find the food here at Boston Harbor Hotel particularly great, I’d have eaten there again because the staff were nice and friendly.
It’s quite noisy at Boston Harbor Hotel, you can hear people outside your room quite clearly and there’s boats honking their horns rather loudly. Other than that it’s relatively quiet. The noise won’t keep you up, especially if you’re jetlagged like we were but it can be a minor inconvenience if that kind of thing bothers you. Looking back I don’t think it was a big deal and definitely not bad enough to make me not go back.
Not sure what’s going on with the lobby, looks like a temporary entrance through the gift shop. No big deal but just a bit weird. Doesn’t look like it’ll be too long before it’s finished and not a big issue. So, in closing, the Boston Harbor Hotel is definitely a hotel I’d be happy to go back to, if I ever find myself in Boston again. Top location, nice, large rooms, great staff, and ok food so ticks almost all the boxes.
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