I received several e-mails from the Westin several days in advance assuring me that I could rest easy. The day of the reservation, I received a phone call asking me to confirm the details of my reservation: one double room with a Riverwalk view and one king room which could be city view. I confirmed all the details and was assured all was well for the reservation which I had made more than a month in advance.
I arrived at the hotel at 2:00 P.M. and found rooms not ready for check-in, an understandable situation since check -in time is 3:00 P.M. normally. We decided to check our bags and explore San Antonio. Arriving back at the hotel at 6:00, we found the front desk to be in complete disarray, the hotel apparently having severely overbooked themselves and now dealing with the consequences, a long, slow moving line of unhappy campers. After a wait of 45-50 minutes, I finally was able to check in and proceed to our rooms: both turning out to be city view.
A warning to those planning to book this hotel, city view has no appeal unless you like parking lots. In addition, city view side is severely affected by the constant roar of bus and traffic noise. Despite appealing to the front desk, no accommodation was forthcoming for changing my elder aunts room to River view and it was only as a reminder that the added River view premium was waived.
From my experience, a confirmed reservation at this hotel has no meaning to the management and I would warn that any reassurances to contrary mean nothing. This applies even for those who are SPG members and who book through the Starwood Preferred Guest website.
On the plus side, the rooms are comfortable and of moderate size, well kept and maintained.
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