Nihal Hotel Dubai Dubai

Not by a long shot is it the finest luxury hotel in Dubai as they say it is on their own website! Okay, we have done A LOT of traveling over the last 7 years and although we by no means were looking for wine on a beer budget and knew this place was a long shot from the Burg Al Arab (Sail) this place was ........ Well let’s just say we can only look back and laugh about it! The staff for the most part were awake at least however VERY slow at actually doing anything. We asked for our fridge in the room to be replaced or fixed on arrival and then 4 times later and finally 4 days after checking in after a firm tone on the 5th request it was finally sorted. The included cooked breakfast was horrible, kinda warm and smelt BAD !!! , Ok have eaten lots of non "western" food over the years but god knows what that was they put out however the milk was at least cold for non cooked food. I did try it all but the rest of our stay we slept in and got something once out while checking out Dubai. The fresh cigarette smoke filled tiny breakfast room didn't do the breakfast any favours either. Once the Night clubs started up around 8 or 9 I think it was each night our room started to stink of cigwrette smoke which wasn't a bonus by any means. Mini bar was not restocked each day however beds were made so that was pretty odd for any hotel in the world. Get receipts for everything they charge you for at the Nihal. On arrival we were instructed they had taken 1 nights payment however on check out there was no mention of it on their system so they tried to charge us again for the first night. The clerk even denied telling us she had taken the payment (probably to save her own but) but after some heated exchange of words and phone calls to both party’s banks it was confirmed the first night WAS infact taken however the hotels system had not been updated. Location wise its bad too although it boasts it is in a great central location. I guess it is, but not for anything you’d be interested in checking out. Trying to get a cab in Dubai is hard enough however thankfully they are cheap, still from this place to get anywhere you’ll be spending heaps on cabs, if you can get one to stop for you that is if you look remotely non Arab or non Indian in this part of town! Booking a cab doesn’t help either, we are still waiting for ours to turn up 7 days and 2 phone calls later! I did have a bit of a laugh playing with a cockroach while my wife had a bath which has given me more to laugh about now so all in all don’t expect much, in fact don’t expect anything other than a roof and smelly Air Conditioning and you walk away fully stoked!