Holiday Inn Express Cartagena Manga by IHG

The breakfast was wonderful, and the breakfast attendant was friendly. Front desk staff were nice, and the rest of the team gave great service. Sharay from housekeeping was wonderful and did a remarkable job. The hotel felt secure, and the room was clean with good TV channels. The pool was amazing too. I highly recommend it for travel within Colombia or international trips.

Traffic noise and constant honking started at 5 a.m., so I left after just one night. If you want to sleep past then, don't stay here. I had reserved January 21 through 24, checked out at 11:30 a.m. on the 22nd, and the hotel refused to waive the final night's charge. I've been Diamond Elite for five years, missed last year by 12,000 points, and am now Platinum Elite. I've never been treated this way by a hotel. I tried to be polite but firm, yet they wouldn't refund even one of the two nights. They told me to call corporate, while corporate said only the hotel could issue a refund. Great service. Do yourself a favor and stay at the Bocagrande location instead. They were wonderful, with no road noise, and I slept well.

After we moved rooms, the complaints stopped completely. Before that, we were repeatedly accused of noise violations even though we weren't making noise. The third-shift front desk clerk was extremely rude. He called to ask us to quiet down, and we apologized, saying we hadn't realized our normal conversation could be heard. While I was on the phone, the neighbors banged on our wall and then our door. We were women alone in the room, and it felt unsafe. We weren't even talking when they banged. When we raised our concerns, the clerk said, “If we want to talk we should go by the pool. Our room is only for sleep.” I've never had hotel staff say that to me. The hotel's response made us feel our concerns weren't valid.

The staff were friendly, and there’s a little supermarket where you can buy drinks or snacks. The restaurant was okay, if a bit expensive for what it offered. You can walk around the city from here, though the main attractions are still far away. My room was close to a disaster. It rained overnight and water got everywhere, leaving the floor slippery enough that I almost fell. The room was hot, and the AC took a while to cool it down. A room flooding like that is really not good for a hotel like this.