Old City Mardin

Breakfast was fresh and good, and the staff helped whenever they could. The room had thick natural stone walls, which made it feel humid, and no windows, so it wouldn’t suit anyone claustrophobic. We could run the AC to circulate air through a pipe installed in the room. The bathroom’s automatic extraction system worked well. Our shower head was awful and splashed water everywhere, though luckily there was a Turkish bath. The water was more lukewarm than warm. The owner said he only switched on the heater at certain times because energy prices in Turkey had skyrocketed. After that, we knew when hot water would be available and didn’t have to bathe in cold water anymore. It’s a great place to stay.

The staff went out of their way to handle our group's food preferences and other requests. I hope management puts money into the rooms, especially their cleanliness. Stone crumbs on the pillow and a broken glass lampshade hanging above your head don’t feel safe or pleasant. I understand wanting to save electricity, but not at my expense, as I’d seen in earlier reviews. They should invest in proper electrical equipment, solar batteries, efficient pumps, and similar improvements.

The room was beautiful and clean, and the breakfast was enough, though nothing special. I’m only giving two stars for the room and the woman who worked there. The hotel has rooms in two different places, not in the same building. They didn’t tell us that the room and view in the photos wouldn’t be ours. They should put this on their page or let guests know before arrival, so people know where to park and can get their bags before walking all the way down. The front desk woman was also extremely unwelcoming. She didn’t seem to know her job and was truly mean to us, questioning us without knowing anything about our arrival. The rest of the experience wasn’t worth it.

This could have been a great place to stay in the heart of a charming city, but the staff made the experience unpleasant. They seemed to care only about getting guests’ money and put no effort into good service. None of the staff currently working there spoke any English, which surprised me in a touristy place like Mardin. That wasn’t the problem, since thankfully my friend could communicate with them in Turkish. It was how poorly we were treated that made the stay bad. Otherwise, I wonder how far they might have gone to fool us. At arrival, they rudely demanded payment before letting us see the rooms. We had to ask repeatedly before they finally showed them. They couldn’t take a foreign credit card, which was very inconvenient. We asked several times for a receipt and never got one. One day they said other guests had arrived and they thought it would be a good idea to move us to another building and give them our room. They insisted on entering our rooms and taking our belongings without consent. After a long argument, we managed to stop them. Breakfast was average, and for some reason they served it in a separate building instead of on the hotel’s lovely terrace.