Landmark International Hotel

The staff were helpful throughout our five-night visit, and we found the rooms comfortable. There were 15 of us, 12 adults and three children, staying at Landmark International Hotel during a holiday in Guangzhou. Its location also made getting to destinations in and outside the city easy.

There are plenty of restaurants, clinics, massage centers, and karaoke lounges around the hotel, and the location is decent, about a 15-minute walk from landmark shopping mall. The building is over 30 years old and still a well-kept 5 star hotel, but it feels ready for a major makeover. The rooms are large, though the furniture is dated. Conceirge service was painfully slow, taking two hours just to bring up a parcel. Smoking from the bar/lounge at the entrance drifts into the lobby, which doesn’t have the atmosphere you’d expect.

I come back to this hotel whenever I’m in Guangzhou. The executive suit has great space in all the rooms, and I’ve stayed in the normal rooms too. Breakfast has a huge range, from traditional Thai and English options to continental food and buffet dishes. It’s central and feels safe, with malls, lots of restaurants, and night markets all within walking distance.

The restaurant has moved from the 10th floor to the lobby, and the food they call 4-star Western fare doesn’t really feel Western. Breakfast is meant to start at 07:00, but the food was cold unless you came after 07:30, when it had begun to warm up. The bread and cakes weren’t fresh, and once they served stale, rancid fried noodle that several guests tried before someone told a supervisor. The chef took it back to the kitchen. This hotel doesn’t seem suitable for Western guests. Luckily, McDonalds was only a short walk away, and we made it through on that.