Rodnikovyi Guest House

For the price, this is great value. The staff are pleasant, the bed is comfortable, and it's clean. There's a large TV, but it's only in one of the two rooms. Tea or instant coffee is provided in the room, along with a handy microwave. We also used the sauna and enjoyed it. The pool water is very invigorating, which works well after the sauna, though kids might find it a bit cold.

We had a great stay, with a few things to keep in mind. International calls are expensive, so we kept in touch with the hotel owners over WhatsApp. Check-in is at 2:00 PM, but they let us in early when we arrived around 10:30 AM. Our room was in a separate building behind the main one and had all the basics: iron, hair dryer, microwave, stove, sink, ironing and drying boards, plus coffee, tea, sugar, and bottled water. The plumbing and furniture were decent. Parking is in front, and there's Wi-Fi in the rooms. The speed varies with how busy the hotel is, but the signal never dropped. It's in a private sector, about a 5-minute drive from Moskovskaya Street, the city's main thoroughfare. Public transport is available too, though I'm not sure about the details :). We tried the sauna with its pool and billiards table, and it was amazing. I recommend it. In our room there were no disposable slippers, soap, or shampoo, though the bathroom did have gel and shampoo in a large tube, which I don't prefer. Soundproofing between our room and the one next door was basically nonexistent. The first night was fine, but on the second we had to listen to our neighbors laughing and talking. My wife loved everything, especially the heated floors in both the room and bathroom. Our relatives also loved their third-floor room with a balcony in the main building. We paid 3,500 Russian rubles for our room, with prices varying by season. The sauna was 1,200 rubles per hour.

Staying here felt like trespassing on someone else's property, with no sense of comfort, and the place and owners left a very unpleasant impression. We've stayed in similar houses around Europe for years without encountering the owners inside the house or on the grounds, let alone having a master suite right next to the guest apartments. The hostess was very unpleasant. She looked through the sauna windows, barged in, and switched off the lights. She also sat smoking with the housekeeper on the guest terrace, watching everyone. They gave us no payment receipt, and we signed or drew up no contract, which seems very strange. It feels like they're hiding their income. For someone claiming 20 years of experience as a hotelier, this behavior is unacceptable.

We only stayed the night, but loved the place. The house is spacious, clean, and well kept, with its own kitchen and bathrooms. The owner was so welcoming even though we arrived at 5 a.m., and they parked our car in the courtyard.