Recife Plaza Hotel

Excellent service. The room was very comfortable. Check in was easy as was checking out. Staff was helpful on recommendations . I found recife to be a beautiful city and I look forward to seeing it again soon

I did see the room before checking in, the paint looked new, you can tell it's been refurbished, there were a lot of lighter/darker bigger/smaller blackspots on the floor tiles and bathroom tiles, so I thought it was artistic, and didn't mind the air conditioning sounded like a truck (didn't need to use), and the shower door sounded like guillotine, cause the 607 had a nice side view of the river. But the water heater stopped after 5 minutes, and the toilet broke down the second time after a staff fixed it, and it made me very baffled about the hotel and went to check it on Booking.com, they had pics of not just newly painted rooms, but bathrooms and floors with new tiles that looked totally different, the creep black spots on the tiles were aged stains! I asked the receiption to get me another room, he first told me its all full, which was a lie, then told me only front rooms had all new interiors, which was a lie too, and finally showed me 309, another side room with everything new just like their pics, including new air conditioning and new toilet, but the floor was too low the view was blocked, so I was movied to 709, all new, but still old creepy black spot tiles in the bathroom, and later found out the old window was banging very loudly when the wind was blowing and it literally had a crack on the glass. How come a refurbished hotel turned out to be such a mess! No more refurbishing was going on. All the side rooms were same price, but some were completely new, some only had new paint, and some only had new bedroom, the receiption who I checked out with didn't even know 309 had new bathroom. It was a nightmare dealing whith the outdated broken craps, and one of their elevators, some time worked some time didn't, but when it worked it only showed "RE" not floor number when taking it... My stay there was horrible, but as I do try to give good advices on TA I'm not completely shoot this one off. Cause this hotel is probably the only hotel that is right by a river if you check on google map, you can see great view of 2 rivers and the ocean from the roof, there is a rooftop pool and river view restaurant, the price is mid range not pricy, and you may get a nice room if it's a completely refurbished one, but you have to, not just see the room, but test absolutely everything, plus bare in mind a lot of buses pass by right in front also,, or you gonna find yourself in a scary movie..

Contrary to what is announced, the hotel does not have a fitness room working, and for a long time. The apparatuses (few and old) are unusable and are not intended to be fixed. To make matters worse, the staff at the hotel keeps lying and making childish excuses each time for the fitness room to be closed at each particular time, so it looks like it's functional - such as saying that "someone is doing a restoration there but will be over right away" (it wasn't, it was just locked), say the closing times wrong and other nonsense. I demanded, they opened it for me, I went in there and took pictures. It seems the management is telling them to lie to guests, which they don't do very well. In fact, management also removed the shampoo (!) off the room bathrooms (not available anymore!) and water from the fridge, this last one now only available on request. Bizarre.

The location, quality and price were very good. I was a bit worried after reading all the negative reviews which complained about the condition of the building. I would say you wouldn´t notice the problems unless you try to look hard for them. I did spend some time exploring the hotel and yes some of the upper floors are in pretty bad state (they are closed). The floors open to the public are good. The hotel is located close to the city center, close to all the historic attractions. Unless your goal is the Boa Viagem beach, I think this is the best location possible in Recife. The location seems safe and there are a lot of people in the area around the hotel until very late. Service was good, people were very friendly. The breakfast was very good. By far better than any hotel-breakfast in the States. Maybe that is a norm in Brazil, I don´t know. Breakfast hours are very convenient too (from 6 to 10). The breakfast had a good selection of hot meals, fruits and also typical breakfast items. Few problems I have encountered: I have never figured out how to get the hot water in the shower, though it didn´t bother me at all, the water is never really cold in this part of Brazil. The staff did not speak English, though everybody was willing to help.

From this hotel you can walk to everywhere in Recife Antigua, the Casa da Cultura, the 13 de Mayo Park and a great mall in Boa Vista. The hotel staff is friendly, as is everyone in Brazil. The rooms are comfortable. The AC and WiFi worked perfectly. I could not figure out the hot water even after it was explained to me at check-in. Make sure you get the staff to demonstrate the hot water with proof that it is working ( it comes out of the shower). I am sure they would be happy to do so. The breakfast is pretty typical cafe da manana (spelling) for Brazil. I had no trouble getting a taxi to the airport at 4AM. If you are staying here to visit Recife Antigua, go during the middle of the week, lots of things are closed on Sunday and Monday. I would definitely stay here again instead of Boa Viagem or some tourist beach area of Recife. The hotel and the area have a lot more character, Boa Viagem could be any beach city in the world. Recife Plaza Hotel is a view of the real Recife.