Meininger Hotel Heidelberg Hauptbahnhof

The Meininger calls itself a hotel but is really caught in between a hotel and a hostel as it has many pros and cons that come into each category. We will start with the pros; This is the cleanest place I've ever stayed in and that lends itself towards a hotel as hostels generally are not like this. Anna is one of the receptionists there and was super efficient and accommodating helping me out with lots of information. The other staff were also very smiley and helpful. There's a kitchen for all the guests to make their own food and has everything you might need...except for a toaster...I suggest that they invest in one! In the kitchen there's a large fridge freezer to put all your food which has to be labelled or it gets thrown away. There's a decent sized communal area next to the breakfast room but I never used it. My room was only 4 beds of which one was a bunk bed and the other 2 were singles which was rather strange. There was a TV in the room which again you wouldn't get in a hostel and the bathroom was inside the room equipped with toiletries and a hairdryer. The shower was excellent and water readily available any time of the day. Each bed has it's own socket and night light but the electricity only worked if the card remained in the slot which proved a nuisance when I wanted to go downstairs to eat but leave my phone in the room to charge. The cons start with the extra money the chain tries to get out of you. The 21€ per night to stay was excellent value but then they want a further 12,90€ for breakfast (which by the way is around 50% dearer than I've ever paid before - including 5 other places in Germany) along with also charging 4,50€ to store your luggage if you arrive early or have a late flight going home. If you add these 2 extras up it actually comes to more than the nightly charge to stay there. The night light in the room is a switch not a moveable lamp meaning it's not really a night light as it shines just as bright as having the light on which defeats the object. Also there's no privacy curtains to each bed so coupled with the night light problem, there's no privacy whatsoever. This was more of an issue too as the beds were very close to each other. The location is excellent for the main station as it can be walked in just 10 minutes, but it's quite a way from the city centre and unless you're prepared to walk 40 minutes you'll need to use transport. The room did have lockers in them but they were worthless. They were designed as furniture into triangular shapes and only big enough for a carrier bag and certainly not any luggage. Finally, I was awoken every night by the vent noise, this was extremely annoying as I get up very early and usually woke feeling more tired than when I went to bed. I don't know exactly what it's supposed to be doing but it's very loud. Overall I would recommend the hotel but you'd need to manage things like I did or you may be disappointed with some of the negatives I've mentioned.

Everything was fully satisfactory, and whenever a problem occurred—mainly a shortage as regards food: we were a school group and you don't seem to grasp precisely the amount of food teen-agers need to eat...—, a lady named Cosima fixed it as soon as she could, bringing some extra dishes. We thank her very much.