Beijing Redwall Hotel: A Review

Location: Beijing, China

Date Visited: December 2009 - January 2010

Rating: 3.5 / 5

The Beijing Redwall is a pleasant hotel located close to the Forbidden City and Jingshan Park, Wangfujing shopping street, and plenty of restaurants! This alone boosted the Redwall's rating. Upon exiting the hotel you are at the back end of the Forbidden City on the Jingshan Park side. A brisk 10 minute walk will find you at a side entrance for the Forbidden City where tickets are sold for entry. If you're hungry, there are a variety of restaurants at the side entrance to choose from for breakfast or lunch offering anything from fine dining to simple 10 Yuan a plate "dives." A continued short walk past this side entrance will drop you at Tiananmen Square and Qianmen Dajie (shopping and restaurant street), both of which are common, but worthwhile tourist sites.

When you've finished touring the nearby park, Tiananmen Square, Qianmen Dajie, and the Forbidden City, you can arrange a tour with the Redwall hotel to view other sites of interest, or simply arrange to rent a car and driver for a day. While it is extremely convenient to be able to arrange these things in the hotel and be picked up and dropped off at the hotel door, both options also have their downsides. The former, arranging a tour does offer a tour guide, and works well for individuals looking to have everything arranged for them. Unfortunately, part of that arranging everything includes several activities that most tourists are disinclined to do on their own, yet forced into on a tour. The Redwall allows tour companies to take guests to several different factories disguised as museums where they are mean to browse and purchase the goods sold there. Only about three minutes of these factories are at all museum like, while the rest is an exhibition room full of goods to buy.

For example, on a tour my friends and I signed up for, we were taken to a Jade "museum." This "museum" consisted of a room where nearly twenty employees were carving out the items to be sold. It was a rather interesting display, although we were a bit annoyed as we were not informed that there would be stop-overs between the sites we were actually interested in. My interest in the display quickly faded as we stepped into the next room filled with poorly constructed posters and several displays of finished Jade products. The tour guide tried to explain the significance of each item and then guided us into the exhibition room. When she noticed that we were absolutely not interested in buying anything, she quickly began picking items up to show us, took us to an area filled with "deals," and then disappeared for an extended period when we still weren't buying. We got it, she was getting paid. We found our way out and waited for nearly 20 minutes in the lobby before our pushy tour guide showed face again. Sadly enough, we had to deal with this three more times throughout the day. I tried to make the best of the situation, but I was pretty annoyed. So, if you're looking to avoid the run-around, booking a tour isn't worth it. However, if you're interested in seeing various Chinese goods factories (jade, silk, and tea) in the middle of your chosen sites (Great Wall, Ming Tombs, Temple of Heaven, etc), then this is the way to go. Everything is planned from around 8:30am when they pick you up, to around 5:30pm when they drop you off. This includes a meal, which although it's cliché, was of decent quality.

The second option, renting a car and driver, is expensive, around 800 -10,000 Yuan, but is a great experience as the driver will take you wherever you want to go for the day. Most of the drivers are able to speak English, or bring someone who can, so no knowledge of Chinese is really necessary. However, the expense of this option is really the only downside, and even this can be offset if you have several people traveling with you to split the cost with. This is also the most comfortable option for a trip to the Great Wall.

Like the transport options, the restaurants amenities also have their ups and downs. There is a small café and bar in the lobby near the front desk, but during my visit it was only open for several hours during the day. Perhaps it has longer hours during the busier summer months, but this was a definite downside for winter travelers. There is also a more formal dining restaurant within the hotel, as well as another smaller restaurant, neither of which were very appealing. While I did not sample the food there, the menus seemed to offer standard fare, and I couldn't help but feel that even those staples would taste better outside the hotel. Luckily, Wangfujing shopping street nearby boasts numerous restaurants to choose from!

The Beijing Redwall offers broadband internet in the room for those who brought laptops, as well as an internet café near the hotel's entrance for those without their own computer. Broadband in the room is about basic for China, not fast, but decent enough to get the job done.

The Beijing Redwall boasts a very friendly and helpful staff. Although we did experience a problem with our check out, the hotel eventually figured it out and acknowledged their mistake and we were given our deposit back. Most staff members speak English, at least at a basic level, so communication wasn't an issue.

Lastly, the rooms at the Beijing Redwall were a fairly nice surprise, especially for its extremely economical price. The only complaint I had with the rooms were the rock hard beds, but these seem fairly common for Chinese hotels. My friend did have significant trouble sleeping on them, which wasn't a great experience, but the rooms were warm, clean, and quiet.

Overall, I gave the Beijing Redwall Hotel a 3.5 out of 5, and would definitely stay at this hotel again. The location is its best asset, with the friendly and professional guest service coming in at a close second. While this isn't exactly a 4 star hotel, it was clean, warm, inviting, and pleasurable; a great choice for any traveler.