Top Hotels in Franz Josef with Spas

We had booked for 2 nights and left after the first night. The washing machine located on the premises and advised to be used by the staff destroyed approximately $600 of laundry that was washed. The blaze, indifferent and eye rolling response from the ‘owner’ was frustrating and unhelpful. After being fobbed off to deal with someone called Logan, his unprofessional business manner and redirection of blame to me was flabbergasting and amazing. After reading Tripadvisor reviews, there is a clear connection with Logan being a previous owner or manager of the motel and now has a strange connection with the faulty laundry that is everyone else’s fault but his. As our stay continued there were more issues to arise. The room was stifling hot. I appreciate that NZ motels are not use to this warm weather and therefore to not have air conditioning but to not include a fan is terrible. We struggled to sleep the first night as we could not get a breeze in the room. Our room backed directly onto the Alice May restaurant which created loud operation noise, cooking smells and light from the restaurant. The bed was far from comfortable. Even though the bed is a King bed capable of becoming 2 singles, there should be a mattress topper on the bed to alleviate the ridge down the middle and the fact the beds are hard and probably old. The linen smelt of oil or cooking fats, I can only assume this is because of the location of the restaurant or the fact the motels washes and dries the towels in full public view in the car park exposed to air from the restaurant. The Terrace was the 6th hotel we had stayed in during our time in NZ. The bathroom amenities they provided are exactly the same brand that some others have provided…the only difference, this motel has obviously watered down the amenities. They were watery and ineffective. Much like the amenities, the shower head in the room was ineffective and pathetic. Cleary during their recent ‘refurb’ these new shower heads had been installed. Unfortunately, ours sprayed every direction but where is should and if you had it turned down too low there was no water but have it too high and it would sting you. The next morning, we decided we could not stay an extra night at the property and checked into another motel for the night. There are plenty of other and no doubt better options in Franz Joseph.

Good conditions and can be trusted

One of the few five-star hotels in New Zealand, the front desk is Chinese. The room is also relatively clean, the restaurant in the hotel is delicious, there will be someone to help carry the luggage when you arrive at the store, the overall feeling is good

The most expensive accommodation for our road trip around South Island. The facilities were lacking, particularly if you had all 9 beds full - you would not have been able to fit everyone into the living space at the same time. Great for accessibility needs but if you had more than four people it would be very cramped. A washer/dryer in the bath room would have been useful. The kitchen facilities were difficult to cook for four of us, the fridge would have been better if it was full size. A BBQ outside would have been nice to help with catering for us four. We expected a bit more for the price paid. The owner checked each evening to see if we were ok, which was great. Consumables were restocked each morning too which was great. We were nestled into the forest which was lovely being in the forest, and the heating was great for the spaces. The free glow worm tour was also great.