My son and I recently stayed at the Hyatt Regency San Francisco (June 5-6) because of the SAT location (convenience rather than early-morning travel to the testing site), and I wanted to share my thoughts on our stay.
First, the positives:
-Gym (9/10) - The hotel had a nice gym with well-stocked towels, sanitation wipes, a water station with cups available, and a good selection of equipment. It was clean and easy to use/manouver through the dedicated space.
-Location (10/10) was perfect to fit our needs (SAT testing site) and had great access to public transportation (BART from the East Bay for us), the Financial District, and Ferry Building activities and views. It was also clean and appeared well maintained.
For the “Meh”
-Staff (7/10 average) -most of the staff (front desk- both checking in and out in person; the IT/television maintenance crew) were very polite and accommodating during our stay (10/10), and I appreciated the room and meal credits when problems arose (mentioned below). The service staff was “ok”(4/10). Our dinner waitress was MIA most of the meal and neither friendly nor rude. Same with the Market’s morning staff person. Both were just “there” to do a job, nothing more, nothing less.
-Room (5/10). It was clean and smelled decent. There were also plenty of towels. Unfortunately, there were issues with both televisions (2/10). Our first room had a television that didn’t work. Despite maintenance staff’s best efforts (changing the cable box and working on the issue for just shy of an hour), it still would not function properly. Although we appreciated the hotel’s accommodation in switching to a different room and providing a complimentary appetizer, there were still issues with the second room’s television. Specifically, while we were watching a rented movie, the television would randomly switch to a different channel away from the movie we were renting/watching. This happened multiple times, even after rebooting the television. Lastly, during our first morning show, it took a good five to six minutes for the hot water to start running in the shower. I was actually concerned that lukewarm was the best it would get. Finally, the bed(s). The mattresses were very hard/firm (it felt as if I were sleeping on the floor), and the pillows offered zero neck support. I also noticed that there was no real blanket on either bed -just a light duvet under another set of sheets. I am assuming that perhaps this is a new “thing,” as I have never come across this set-up before.
Worst of the Worst
-Food (1/10) Oh, my. This was not the experience I was expecting. First, arrival snack (quesadilla) for my son. This item was overly microwaved. The cheese, he said, tasted a bit burnt, and the tortilla was very hard yet had a very greesy look/fim to it. He stated he only ate it because he was “starving”.
For our dinner, we opted for the complimentary chicken bites appetizer (it was “ok” 5/10), but the rest of the meal was not good.
The French dip was, for the most part, inedible (1/10). It was so incredibly salty, I managed two bites of the first half and then gave my son the rest. He agreed that it was very salty, with no other flavor.
His smash burger wasn’t much better (3/10). He ate a few bites, then opted to take the rest with us, hoping he would feel like eating it later. Unfortunately, it didn’t get much better, and he ended up throwing it away. The fries for both sides were “meh” at best. Freezer-burnt tasting, with no other flavor beyond that.
We opted for a slice of triple chocolate cake to go. Unfortunately, this too was horrible (2/10). The cake itself was very dry and stale (maybe a week old????), and the fruit (berries, I think) that accompanied it was very mushy (perhaps frozen, then thawed in the microwave). It took a while to figure out if they were cherries or berries because of both the consistency and the lack of real fruit taste. The whipped cream was just “there”, with no real flavor.
Our morning breakfast (1/10) was consistent with our previous food experiences at the hotel. The coffee (10/10) was the best part. The egg sandwich had toasted bread that seemed to have been reheated in the microwave. It was overly heated and hard as a rock. The egg was also deeply overcooked and rubbery. The bacon was burnt. Unfortunately, I had to throw it away and just drink my coffee. The breakfast burrito (3/10) came out so hot that my son had to wait 10 minutes to start eating it. He stated that he could “kind of” taste the scrambled eggs in it but not much else. The tortilla was very hard, so he didn’t eat any of that and ate about 1/3 of the inside.
Overall, the food was shockingly bad, and if anyone asks us in the future about our experience, I would strongly suggest they eat elsewhere. Even prepackaged Starbucks across the street would have been a better option.
***Although I did appreciate the $50 room credit at the end of our bill for our overall food experiences, I would be really hard-pressed to recommend this hotel, especially for the overall cost I did end up paying . I had high hopes for our stay (name recognition, location, price point); it unfortunately was not an overall pleasant experience. And if anyone in our family were to stay there again, it would be for the convenience of the location and the great gym, nothing more.
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