Wellness Hotel Happy Star

A handy base for hiking and shopping, with wellness as a nice extra.

The hotel is lovely, with plenty to offer, and the room cleaning and service were very good. The restaurant was a different experience. We ate there a couple of times, and the food was okay, but the staff, apart from a few exceptions, seemed inexperienced and inattentive. They forgot our orders and brought completely different dishes, even though we pointed to the menu items in Czech. Nobody apologized. One waiter also spilled a whole beer on the table, and it was only replaced after we asked. The hotel itself is good, though there are better restaurants nearby.

The location works well if you have a car, though the hotel is some distance from town. Rooms are spacious and clean, and the bathroom was clean too. The food tastes good, with a few dishes that are especially good. The gym felt a bit small and stuffy.

The lunch was very good, but it seems the kitchen closes early in the evening. Our stay at the HAPPY STAR HOTEL was otherwise terrible, and when we raised problems, nobody seemed to care. In the room, there was animal hair on the chest of drawers, human hair on the “FRESH” towels, and stains on the bed cover. The room beside the playroom in the basement had no daylight, and its window couldn’t be opened for fresh air. The bathroom extractor fan also left us wondering where fresh air was supposed to come from while it was running. The TV had only Czech channels, even though the Austrian border is 100m away. If the hotel only wants local guests, it should say so in its advertising. On arrival, nobody offered a friendly greeting or told us about meal times, the restaurant, wellness hours, WiFi, local activities, or sightseeing. None of the employees spoke English. Some spoke broken German, which made communication difficult and led to misunderstandings. In general, staff didn’t seem allowed to greet guests, be pleasant, or wish them a nice stay or day. It felt like arriving back in a country under communist rule. My colleague tried to book a 70min massage just after we arrived. The woman there explained in a mix of half Czech and broken German that no masseur was present and nothing could be booked. Only after we pressed the matter for a while and called the woman over in surprise at a wellness hotel did a massage therapist apparently come from outside. We went to the restaurant at about 8:40 p.m. The waiter took our drinks order without asking if we wanted food, and no menu came to the table. Our drinks arrived at 20:45, still without a menu or any notice that the kitchen closed at 9:00 p.m. We had to get a menu ourselves. At 20:55, when we tried to order dinner, the waiter said there was nothing left to eat. The website clearly says Monday to Thursday the hotel is open from 7:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., with cooking until 9:00 p.m. We ended up having to go to Excalibur City to get another dinner.