Gulnaraxanum Hotel

We spent a week here in a pretty, nicely decorated, clean room. The staff were very friendly, and the breakfast was so good. It’s also right in the center, a nice place to stay while visiting Bukhara.

The cleaners were kind and did their jobs really well. The location is very nice and close to the main tourist spots, the rooms were nice and cleaned every day, and breakfast was okay. But the owner’s son and the owner made our whole stay miserable. Before arriving, I had discussed the rooms and prices with the owner’s son. We were welcomed nicely when we got there. Then around 11pm, when we came back, the son, who is 15, said he’d made a mistake after speaking with his mother, the owner, and demanded double the price. We spent literally an hour arguing about it, with our bags already open and having used the rooms. The mother didn’t come upstairs, while her son went down at least 10 times to ask her to agree to the price. We’ve been to at least 40 countries and never encountered this much incompetence. In the end, we reached an agreement only after threatening to leave, and paid 60-80 percent more than we had agreed. The mood for the next two days changed instantly, and the looks we got were awful. There was also a serious security problem with the room keys. Guests have to hang them in the hallway in front of the front desk when leaving. Often there were no workers there, so anyone could take the keys and enter. When we brought this up, the son made another problem of it and said someone was always there with cameras. On our departure day, we left our bags in the hallway to collect later, but when we came back, nobody was there for five minutes. Anyone could have taken the keys or bags.

The location is fantastic, and the air-conditioned rooms are nice. We liked the place, though several small things made our stay less convenient. Breakfast was much lighter than at most guesthouses we've stayed in, so we went elsewhere afterward. We also weren't offered takeaway food for our 6 a.m. train, as we've been at other places. We'd bought breakfast in advance and left it in the communal fridge, but it was locked in the morning. Getting our food meant ringing the bell and waking people up. There's no fridge in the room, and the communal one is kept locked, so storing food is tricky. There's also nowhere to refill water, which means buying more plastic bottles. We were required to leave our room key by the front desk each time we went out. It was labeled and hung in a public area, and the desk and keys were mostly unattended during the day. Staff said the camera made this fine, but we were concerned about our valuables and didn't understand why keeping the key was necessary. If they need a spare, it would make more sense to keep their own copy securely behind the desk. The bed had only a sheet, which was actually a zipped duvet cover, with no blanket.

The family who runs the hotel welcomed us so warmly. I stayed with my family, and we had a great experience. The service was good, and the location is very convenient.