Hotels With Pools in Thanh Hoa Province, Vietnam

MELIA VINPEARL in downtown Thanh Hoa is a six-star hotel, masquerading as a five-star home away from home, to re-quote a line from my previous review of my favourite KL hotel. But Melia is even more of a home away from home for a neighbouring guest like me from Asean because Thanh Hoa isn't exactly a bustling capital city as Kuala Lumpur (KL)...or a country where English or Malay (my native tongues) predominates. It's got more of a rural city countryside vibe, steeped in the soul of national history, like Jogjakarta in Indonesia, for instance.  It claims Vietnam's earliest legendary hero Le Loi as its hometown hero although he's accurately from a small hamlet nearer to its airport in Tho Xuan, called Lam Son; which apparently is being scaled upfor high-end tourism.  Back to Melia Vinpearl in Thanh Hoa. Why do I love i, rate it and recommend it without reserve?  Two reasons which are from the top, literally: 1. Its hotel manager, Robert Ngo, a hometown boy from Kon Tum (a 20-hour bus ride away in Vn's Central Highlands), now calls Da Nang home, but whose full dynamic homework is all about ensuring the energetic vibes of this gem of a hotel. You can feel the sense of being cocooned and spoiled by its A-star service and staff - from frint-desk to backend (housekeeping, room service et.al) and this energy originates from Robert (see pic of Bob and me at the breakfast buffet on the 6/f which has a fantastic spread.  The USP of Robert's theme is, well, pretty basic at its roots: pricing. The rates are horribly impossible to reject for such all-round six-star excellence.  2. Its 34th-storey penthouse-feel restaurant whose menu was curated by Robert personally when he took charge a couple of years back. He leveraged on the strongest suit of the hotel's class master chef, focusing on honing the latter's favourite culinary skillls.  A pared-down menu where each dish starts with delicious and elevates to 😋 yum 😋 excellence. My particular favourite: the boneless chicken served  with a side of mashed potatoes. Irresistible! And that's coming from a culinary curmudgeon who likes chicken least of all ”meats” despite originating from the homes of Chinese chicken rice - Malaysia and Singapore. If you wanna get the calming comfort of a long cool evening indoors dining for a couple of hours, this sky-high restaurant is the place...and sharing it with the hotel's watering hole - the Skybar - helps. The frozen margaritas ate consistently excellent and the whiskey sour, superb. As for the rest of the hotel, well, it's worth every ringgit, sgd, USD, Euro and yeah, penny you have for a trip's accommodation - go find out. It's utterly value-added worth it!  YAP, Koon Hong Malaysian-born Singaporean, who may well decide to call Vietnam home soon. 🇸🇬 🇲🇾🇻🇳

Lovely hotel. Unfortunately, many things were closed during the off-season. Still, highly recommended. 👍🏻

The newly opened hotel's decor and facilities are acceptable; however, the service really needs improvement. The most frustrating thing was the indifferent attitude of the front desk staff. Because I woke up late, I called the hotel hoping to delay my check-out, but was immediately refused; the reason given was that all rooms were booked, even though the booking platform showed more rooms available than the previous day. How can such inhumane management retain customers?! Because I needed to stay an extra day for work, I decisively booked another hotel!

Great service, clean room, very good food at the hotel, will come back next time

The accommodation is beautiful but the location is not close to the nice views, attractions or restaurants. So you rely on transportation which the hotel could make more clear. They also didn’t advertise any activities and since their English wasn’t great, you’re kind of left with organizing yourself. It was also difficult to contact them bc they’re not fast in replying to emails, there’s no WhatsApp number on their website, and I couldn’t call with my phone data package. So while the accommodation is great, and Pu Luong is incredibly beautiful, the hotel staff could be more forthcoming with customer service.

Room amenities cannot add towels until the day is over

As previously written, to get to the hotel you need to overcome a steep downhill (very steep!), and when you have two healthy suitcases and rain - the task is not simple. There is a loader in the hotel - you can ask him for help. The hotel itself is located next to the most beautiful terraces (go to the reserve itself, but there the views will be humble). You must take a bike - because the heights are over (we were on foot, which we later regretted), not to call a taxi in this area. And not all locals agree to take a money. The hotel is a pleasure: A chic look, very responsive staff. Minorities: There is no shower cabin, the water is flowing on the floor to the toilet, because of which the constantly wet floor and legs (traces start to stretch across the whole room), raw. There is no vai faya, but we are not critical. No noise isolation - both the neighbors from the bottom and everything that is happening around. Breakfast is normal, but it didn't like that one portion for two. If the salad for two is enough, here is no omlet at all. It's a minus. In general on 1-2 nights are good.