Sonesta Select Pleasant Hill

The quiet, peaceful feel here has been great during the couple of weeks I've stayed. Most guests seem to be workers from out of town who leave early and come back in the evening, so much of the time the hotel feels like it's mine. Parking has been easy and has felt very safe so far. My room has a vaulted ceiling, floor-to-ceiling blackout curtains, and a giant TV with HBO and Netflix. The bed and pillows are amazingly comfortable, and there's a big patio outside the room that's lovely to sit on at night. I also like the couch, with outlets for charging and working, and the oversized ottoman for putting my feet up. The shower has glass doors, white tile, and good water pressure, which helps get all the shampoo out of my hair. It comes with shampoo, conditioner, and shower gel in dispensers instead of little plastic bottles, which I love. Housekeeping does a fantastic job. I came back to a sparkling room that looked like I hadn't even stayed there. There's a new gated dog park with plenty of room for my little dogs. Jay, the general manager, gave me a large dog bed and water dish, and there are complimentary dog snacks in the lobby. Those touches make it feel like home for me and my dogs. The lobby is stunning, and although I haven't eaten breakfast, the spread I've seen looks very nice. There's also a snack shop up front, which is handy when I'm feeling lazy and don't want to spend on DoorDash. Thanks so much for making my stay wonderful. I love this hotel.

We had a nice three-night stay, mostly because the room was big and clean and the location was so convenient. It's right across from that pretty, upscale outdoor shopping area in Pleasant Hill, where we found Paris Baguette, a 10-star bakery! The staff seemed a little preoccupied, but they were courteous. The nighttime desk clerk, Jacky or Jaky, was especially friendly and helpful. They found us pizza delivery at 10 p.m. on Thanksgiving. There were a few issues in the room. The refrigerator was actually a freezer and froze our road-trip food. They offered to replace it, but we said we'd let everything thaw. The toilet paper holder was broken, and we asked them to fix it after we left. The elevators felt a bit janky and sometimes smelled like pot or beer. For the room price, it was a shame there wasn't free breakfast, or even just coffee in the lobby.

The room smelled strongly of B.O. as soon as my girlfriend and I walked in, almost like someone had left only 20 minutes earlier. Then, around 2 a.m. on a busy Saturday, management interrupted us to complain that our TV was too loud. It was set at 25-30 on a scale that goes to 100. They said if it could be heard outside the door, we had to turn it down or off, or we'd be asked to leave. I found the way they put that extremely disrespectful. We were paying about $150 a night, just two people watching a movie. We weren't having a party, playing music, talking excessively, or drinking. I think we should be able to watch a movie at midnight with the volume below 50 out of 100, especially when that's the scale the hotel programmed. I can understand being considerate of noisy neighbors, but expecting guests to keep things at church-level quiet on a holiday Saturday night feels unreasonable.

The rooms were neat and clean, and the location was convenient for restaurants and shopping. Berkeley was only about 25 minutes away, and San Francisco took around 45 minutes without traffic. Service was uneven: when I asked a female receptionist for fresh towels in the morning, she said no one was available and told me to come downstairs later to ask at the desk. The room also wasn't cleaned while we were out sightseeing, even though I had requested it. The male staff member on duty at night, though, was very nice and gave great service.