Hotels near The Valley of a 1000 Hills, Hillcrest

I stayed here for 3 nights recently and it was a lovely place. Easy to locate, beautiful grounds (two pools!) and clean, comfortable rooms with very good air conditioning (important!). The entire staff was very friendly, even the security guard knew me by name. The daily breakfast was delicious. The hotel itself is walking distance from a grocery store as well as a busy street with lots of restaurants. It's a ~15 minute Uber ride to the beach and some other main attractions. And for the price, I feel like you can't get much better of a value. I would definitely recommend staying here.

I'm sorry but this place may look nice on pictures and superficially nice but everything is cheap and service is quite poor. The plastic wood everywhere is tacky, windows are so thin you hear all the traffic on the roadside while on the yard side there is LOUD partying til very late. The staff assured me it would stop at 23, but this was not true, it continued til 2 am. The staff in reception seems truly clueless at most things, this is probably because they have no training and hardly any salary. The poor manager on duty seems to constantly have to rush and make right the various mistakes made, she seems to do nothing but apologise all day to costumers. The owners of the hotel clearly prioritise their own pockets over providing service. A few examples of cheapness: 1.No folder with information in the room - I am referred to the website. The tebsite says iron and ironing board in your room. I looked and looked, couldn't find it. I called reception and they said I can fetch it from the lobby (another hotel would have brought it to my room...). I went down to lobby, carried the ironing board up in the elevator etc. to my room and then found the iron to be old and dirty, it dirtied my blouse and the steam function didn't work properly there was just a lot of water coming out, leaving water stains on my other top.... Just replace the iron when it is old? If a guest calls, deliver the iron and board to the room? Change the information on the web... not so difficult things if you want to make a good impression.. 2.My collegue had a paid and booked transport to the airport that had been forgotten by the staff despite that he reminded them a few hours before and they ensured him it was settled. Once it was due - no transport. He nearly missed his flight. The poor manager lady had to book an uber for him and give him cash... 3. I gave them laundry one morning, thinking it would be finished by the evening or the next day, like all other hotels. By next evening it was not finished (it was 3 small items, no dry cleaning). They seemed to be looking for it as if they had lost it. When I was checking out 2 days after handing in the laundry, the woman in reception admitted one of my tops had been lost... When I complained about this and point 4 below, they did offer compensation, but I had to send a recepit of a new top and fill in forms etc. hassle. 4. After a long week of work staying at this hotel I was looking forward to sleeping 8 hours until leaving on Saturday. The Friday partying however started already at 4 pm with a DJ. I had the room facing the courtyard and asked the manager how long the partying would continue. Oh we have a curfew at eleven in Durban, she said, it will definitely be quiet after that! I’m not from South Africa so I believed her and felt OK I can sleep from 11 to 8 am, that’s OK. My room turned out to be just above the party and it felt like it was IN my room. I was trying to finalise my work from 21.00 to 23.00 with the boomi

This B&B sports 12 good sized to frankly large rooms, in Umhlanga Rocks, around 40 yards from the beach (our bathroom, in #3, was humongous, and beautiful). Hosts are so nice, and tolerated many COVID associated rebooking from us, and others. Grounds have a nice pool, and many cozy nooks for reading. Not many games in house, so bring your own entertainment. Breakfasts are great. Cowrie Cove is over a mile from Umhlanga, and thus over a mile from any eating or shopping establishment. Uber rides are only around 100 Rand round trip—more like 400 R for a round trip for Durban. The area has been hit hard by rains, and the beach has a lot of trash on it. Beach is pretty narrow and steep, too, and it’s hard to walk long distances on it—but that is not this establishments problem.