Although we would have preferred to stay somewhere closer to the convention center for PAX Prime in Seattle last weekend, we graciously accepted the kind gesture from Kingston Technology to cover our accommodations at the Hilton Bellevue Hotel, located just across the bridge from Seattle. It was about a 20 minute drive to the convention center each morning.
The Hilton Bellevue is actually right next door to the Red Lion Bellevue where we stayed last year for PAX, just off the I-405. The Hilton Bellevue, much like the Hotel Embassy Suites (also a Hilton property) in the Greater Los Angeles area, is a business-oriented hotel. What this means is that every room is generally equipped with a proper desk and office chair where you can set up your laptop and get some work done.
The hotel itself definitely feels dated and the decor is due for an update, but most of the basic amenities are there. You have access to power outlets for the workstation, there’s an MP3-capable alarm clock, and while there is no complimentary breakfast, you do get coffee and tea in the room. I would have liked to see an in-room fridge, but you do get an ice bucket in lieu. The stay at the Hilton Bellevue was generally comfortable, but they did seem a little unorganized for the busy Labour Day weekend.
When Kingston booked the rooms for us, they requested two rooms, each with two beds. When we arrived, all they had were two rooms with one bed each. They were actually overbooked for the weekend, so they couldn’t even move us to different rooms. When I asked for a rollaway bed, they told me there would be a $15 charge, even though they couldn’t accommodate the request for two double beds in each room.
And when it came time to pay, they weren’t able to run the charges on the Kingston credit card, so I had to pay up front and wait to be reimbursed. Kingston certainly can’t take any fault for this; Hilton just needs to be better organized on an administrative level. I did appreciate that, at the end, they didn’t charge us for Wi-Fi, parking or the rollaway bed.
In any case, my brief video hotel room tour of the Hilton Bellevue has been embedded below. Make sure you check out the PAX Prime 2013 video coverage we shot over at MEGATechNews too, as well as the Facebook photo album and the video coverage at Futurelooks.
Actually Michael I think the room looked pretty clean. The administrative errors, though,kill the overall grade I would give it. For me, it’s all about the service. You don’t have that and I start to think “what else is wrong.”