Review: San Carlos Hotel

Let’s talk hotels. In New York City.

Oy vey.

If you’ve been following along on our Big Apple Adventure, you know that we’ve just arrived in Manhattan at our hotel…the San Carlos. Let's talk about our accommodations.

In doing my research before our trip, I probably spent more time in hotel research than anything else. There’s SO many things to consider when choosing a hotel – such as location, price, size, quality, etc – and this is especially true when choosing a hotel in Manhattan.

Take location, for instance…do you want to stay in the heart of Times Square? That’s great if you want to be within walking distance of a lot of the “touristy” stuff – but it could be horrible when it comes to noise…or cost. So – if having a quiet, peaceful night’s sleep is important to you – you may choose to NOT be in the heart of Times Square.

So…I researched. And researched. And researched again. I like my sleep. I like peace and quiet. I also like space – and we had three people to fit into a room. A lot of hotel rooms in Manhattan are about the size of a person’s closet – so this was disconcerting to someone who is a bit claustrophobic.

I finally discovered the San Carlos Hotel – located at 150 East 50th Street…in the Midtown East location in Manhattan. Tripadvisor.com had it ranked #32 out of 435 hotels in New York City – which is pretty darn good.



As far as location, it was excellent…it was one block away from a major subway line, and it was just a few blocks away from Times Square and Broadway. However – it was FAR enough away to afford us a bit of peace and quiet when we retired for the night. During the day, there was some construction going on, both on our hotel and a hotel directly across the street (probably more like some remodeling), but the work would finish at a decent hour each night and didn't bother us.


The view out of one of our windows...we overlooked the front of the hotel, and you can see the construction going on across the street....



However - we did realize we must have been very close to a fire station, as we seemed to have at least one fire truck go by our window just about every day. With their sirens blazing. Eventually, we must have tuned it out - in typical New York fashion. In fact, when Hubby went to take some photos of the exterior of our hotel - he managed to inadvertently get the beginning of a fire truck in his photo:




Immediately next door to our hotel was a very small (think 50 square feet) sliver of a convenience store - which was perfect to pop in and grab a soda, or a snack, or a bottle of water as we headed out for the day.

The price…was adequate. It wasn’t the cheapest – nor the most expensive – but for what we got (a suite), it was reasonable.

Speaking of a suite, we had plenty of space. We had a small kitchen area, a dining table with two chairs, a pull-out sofa bed that Daughter used, and two good-sized closets.


The living room...the sofa would fold out into a bed for daughter every night....



Our room...the queen-sized bed was more than adequate...and it was comfortable. The pillows were even comfortable - yay!



The kitchenette...which came fully stocked with glasses, plates and silverware...which made eating late-night cupcakes a breeze!


And quality? Wow. It was always clean; the concierge and doorman were always attentive; we had turn-down service every night (including chocolates on our pillows); free internet; luxurious robes and bath products; and free continental breakfasts. On rainy days, they provided free umbrellas to the guests to borrow for the entire day...which we handily used and were most appreciative. We were treated like royalty - and we loved it.

We had Room #701 - a corner suite on the 7th floor - RIGHT by the elevators. We loved our corner room - it was extremely quiet from other hotel noise, and we also loved being close to the elevator. This made it handy when we'd get back to our room late at night, laden down with shopping bags....And the elevators? Wow - easily the fastest elevators I've experienced; we NEVER had to wait for a slow elevator.

And bed bugs?

None. None to speak of.

All in all, we loved our hotel. We would most definitely stay there again for future trips - and I would recommend it in a heartbeat to anyone visiting.

We checked in around 4:30 pm...and although check-in was smooth and painless, we barely had time to throw our suitcases in the room before having to head out for our dinner reservations. Luckily, our restaurant was just a few short blocks - so, we freshened up and headed out to dinner...which will be reviewed in the next post.

It will be the one in which I basically eat an entire cow.