CHECK inn Taichung Ziyou

For the price, this was a great deal. Similar rooms elsewhere would cost more, and ours was clean and spacious. Self check-in was straightforward, with a staff member available to help if anything went wrong.

We regretted booking four nights. Housekeeping only emptied the rubbish, changed the towels, and replaced the tea and slippers. Even with a sign asking for the room to be made up, we came back to hair still on the floor. I was left wondering whether they cleaned the bathroom or replaced the drinking mugs at all. The lobby had a strange smell, and the rooms did too. When we arrived, there was hair all around the bathroom shower area. The location is central, with popular restaurants nearby, including Michelin Bib places and cafes, but I wouldn’t recommend staying more than one night.

For a budget hotel, it’s decent for the price, and the staff were quick to respond to my Expedia messages. One employee helped me check in, and when I complained that my oddly shaped third-floor room was noisy because of the family next door, they offered to move me. I packed up, then the front desk explained the family wasn’t staying another night. I moved anyway, since I’d already mentally checked out of that room. The seventh-floor room had a much more sensible layout. In the morning, someone nearby played an instrument from around 10, and the sound insulation was poor, though it was waking hours. Cleanliness could be better. Gunk in corners and on windows is harder to clean, but the ledge under the TV and both dressers were covered in black specks and dust that wiped off easily. It took me two minutes. It felt like they’d only bothered to wipe the sink before a 4pm check-in. There’s no lobby bathroom. You can use the one at the hotel two doors away, where the 200 NT buffet is held.

The staff were incredibly friendly. They helped me check in on the machines when my French Visa debit card wouldn’t work, changed my first room in under five minutes because it hadn’t been cleaned, and warmed up my leftover pizza when I needed help. But the place was horribly dirty. The first room had stains and hair in the toilet. The second had hair all over the floor and a sticky floor. The carpet in the corridors looks like it’s never been washed. In my experience from years in hundreds of hotels, this is a common problem in Taiwan: cheaper options often neglect cleanliness while prioritizing looks or bad design. In France, or even Japan, a one-star hotel might look rough or be oddly located, but at least it would be clean, which is what most people want first.