-
I was asked (by @Pauline IIRC) to do a post about this hotel, and we really enjoyed out stay, so here goes!
Last month we did 5 nights in Dubai followed by 5 nights in Doha – I had booked award seats on QR direct to MAN for 21k avios plus about £60 each for our return.
I had a stash of Bonvoy points to burn and redemption prices in Doha were very reasonable. I eventually settled on the Ritz Carlton at the RC marina (there’s another RC, but it doesn’t seem to cause any confusion, taxi drivers knew immediately where we meant). For 220k points I could book 5 nights in a club room, and I had read that the club offering is very good indeed, which turned out to be correct.
The hotel isn’t as glitzy as some from the outside, but the location is pretty good, about 30 mins from the airport and within 10 mins of a couple of decent shopping places. We weren’t interested in going further afield on this occasion, however, the hotel will arrange excursions and there is a dive centre nearby, although OH didn’t bother this time.
We arrived quite late due to the 11 pm flight in from DXB but there were numerous extremely helpful staff around. They scan your bags each time you enter, we were not sure why! This kind of set up always makes us laugh as they didn’t make any attempt to search people, and if you were carrying any food items they didn’t scan the bags they were in!
We were checked in very quickly and informed that the club room also entitled us to breakfast in the restaurant as well as the lounge, plus a choice of gift amenity, including a splendid afternoon tea in the elegant lobby lounge, which we opted for, as well as a raclette offering, laundering of 3 garments and 1000 bonus points. Note that I am only Bonvoy silver these days so you might get extra benefits with higher status on top of all this!
The interior is very attractive and Art Deco in feel, despite the hotel being built in the early 2000s. There are some eye-popping chandeliers but the rest is fairly understated and very elegant. Both the lobby lounge and Sel et Miel brasserie look out onto the exterior which made them feel very light and spacious.
Not all rooms have balconies – I think the hotel is more geared to business travellers, however there are plenty of amenities for leisure travellers and indeed there seemed to be quite a few local and international families staying. We were given a room with a small balcony which was a minor upgrade and had a nice view over to the Pearl. The room itself was beautiful with a supremely comfortable king-sized bed and plentiful supplies of tea and coffee, plus bottled water and a large fruit plate. Each evening the turndown service left different types of dates by the bed (which I love but OH not so much!) There was a kettle and coffee machine (Nespresso or similar), but no fresh milk, grrr. We got some from the Carrefour nearby and kept it in the good-sized mini bar/fridge. There are pictures of the room on the Marriott website so I don’t need to go into too much detail. For @Harry T, the air con was satisfyingly Middle Eastern.
The bathroom was a nice sumptuous marble affair with Diptyque Philosykos toiletries. For @Aston100, loo roll was thick and plentiful, as expected! The toilet was in its own separate cubicle (as was the large shower), but we were highly amused that it had a full-length glass door which didn’t do anything for privacy and made one feel like Bond villain Silva in his transparent cell in Skyfall 😂
We had breakfast twice in the main restaurant, The Lagoon, where you can eat either indoors or outside in the hotel grounds (there were a lot of flies, even though it wasn’t that hot). The breakfast buffet was superb, you could eat there every day for about a month and have something different each time. You could order egg dishes and freshly made, delicious flatbreads. I am now a total labneh addict as well!
The lounge deserves a special mention. We were expecting to eat out in the evenings, but in the event we didn’t need to. Having lounge access is effectively being on an AI stay, and the lounge itself is beautiful, with lots of comfy seating and floor-to-ceiling windows with sweeping views over the Gulf. It serves breakfast (less choice than the main restaurant but still very good, with an omelette chef), followed by light lunch, followed by mini afternoon tea. The blurb says “evening hors d’oeuvres”, however, this turned out to be a hot buffet each night with two meat and a veggie choice. It was so good we ended up eating there each evening, though that wasn’t the original plan! If you want a drink it’s especially convenient, as there seem to be very few places in Qatar where you can have alcohol. There was an okay selection of red and white wine plus beer and spirits, and staff were continually on hand to fill up your glass – they also seem to learn your preference within about 5 minutes!
The grounds are very nice with lots of greenery and a lagoon-style pool with a waterfall and ledges where you could hang out if you were with a group of friends or it was really hot (it was only about 23-25 degrees when we were there). As soon as you appear, the pool attendants will find you a lounger and towel, and a couple of times they came round with complimentary mocktails. There were also hot and cold tubs, however, my one gripe would be that hot tub always seemed to be full of children, despite this technically not being allowed! We didn’t use the indoor facilities, however there was a large indoor pool with sauna, steam room and hot tub, all spotlessly clean as you would hope. I read that there’s a decent gym as well, though I wouldn’t go near one on holiday!
If you want to go off property, it’s very simple to summon an Uber, which comes to the hotel entrance. This isn’t a wider review of Doha (to be honest, we didn’t see much of it!), however if you want to shop in luxurious surroundings, the Place Vendôme mall, about 10 minutes away, is like a cross between Paris and Las Vegas!
All in all this was a lovely stay, and of course an astonishingly good use of Bonvoy points.
“The toilet was in its own separate cubicle (as was the large shower), but we were highly amused that it had a full-length glass door which didn’t do anything for privacy and made one feel like Bond villain Silva in his transparent cell in Skyfall 😂”
This made me laugh so much that I went to check the website … and yes it is exactly like that. It’s like they accidentally double-ordered the glass shower doors and thought “sod it – we’ll use them for the toilets too” 😀 😀
I forgot to add – there is a small, private, man-made beach which is quite pleasant – lots of loungers plus toys for children. You can either walk 5 minutes to get there or get one of the hotel golf carts. They seem to be in the process of turning it into a more “beach club” type affair which people can pay to use even if they’re not staying at the hotel, which is not necessarily an improvement!
@Savage Squirrel, I know, what a waste of glass, as presumably there’s one in every bathroom!
@NorthernLass thank you so much. Sounds very similar to the RC Abu Dhabi which we really like for a relaxing break – we never eat out there either as the lounge food is so good and more than enough. You can’t book club on points though.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
Popular articles this week:
