Hotel Stella Maris

Our three-night reservation at Stella Maris Hotel turned into the worst hotel experience I’ve had anywhere. We’d told the staff our flight would get in at about 23:00, and they said our keys would be in a security box outside, with a code sent to us. Their email and the hotel’s street door also gave an emergency number. We arrived straight from the airport at about 00:30, but the code didn’t work, even after several tries. The person who answered the emergency number, "Ishned," said he couldn’t help because he was at the Raphael hotel, 5 km away. He said he couldn’t call his boss because the boss was asleep, and that it wasn’t his problem to deal with. At 1:30 a.m. we were still out on the street, feeling really unsafe, with two homeless people approaching me and my wife. I tried to book another Hamburg hotel for the night, but it was too late and there were no rooms available. Eventually another guest came out and tried to help with the box. We couldn’t open it, but we got into the building and ended up sleeping in reception, on two small chairs and one small couch. We’d just taken a 13-hour flight and another two-hour flight. When the receptionist arrived at 7 a.m., we told her what had happened, but she didn’t apologize. They gave us a room key, my wife went up, opened the door, and found a woman sleeping in the room. After all that, the manager said she was sorry and offered us a better room, free breakfast, and a free stay for the days we’d already booked.