Hilton Garden Inn Bali Ngurah Rai Airport Review
The Hilton Garden Inn Bali is in walking distance from the International Terminal at Bali International Airport. While there is a hotel shuttle you can easily walk 15 minutes to the hotel. However make sure you know how to repel aggressive stray dogs at night.
Check-in was rather quick. I spoke to two attendants - one with just the most basic knowledge of Hilton Honors and a much more senior attendant who was able to distinguish a room type. The senior agent was a delight and once she took over the check-in moved rooms and assigned keys in 60 seconds.
The Hilton Garden Inn Bali Airport is a brand new development with 180 rooms. Rather unique for Indonesia is well sound proofed with double pane windows. The noisy road and even the runway is almost 100% blocked out.
The rooms are somewhat small but very modern with a lovely bathroom and great beds. The WiFi was initially really slow but after we called to get a separate router in our room the speed improved somewhat. Expect 2-3 Mbit with better speeds at night.
The hotel features a beautiful pool area that makes you feel like you are in a resort and not in proximity to the airport (unless a plane roars for takeoff just behind you). It's a jewel.
As a Hilton Diamond breakfast was included and is served in the main lobby. The staff is friendly but simply overwhelmed by huge Chinese tour groups that take over the lobby between 9 AM and 10.30 AM. Expect scenes That would not happen in Mainland China even.
This was the biggest downside of a affordable and otherwise great hotel - the amount of aggressive Chinese tourists in large groups crated so much noise that enjoying a hotel was hard (at times).
At the last day of our stay a 6.2 strong earthquake shook the island and the building was bending and rattling. However it was built well enough to not suffer and visible damage. The hotel staff did not seem rattled and simply carried on with their duties. No announcement was done or siren rang.
The hotel charges just $60 or 5,000 Hilton Honors (!) points per night and could be a wonderful place if it chose it's guests a little wiser.