Name: Hotel Tara
Address: Calea Clujului 25 Alba Iulia,Calea Clujului, Alba Iulia, Alba Iulia, Alba Iulia, 510049, Romania
Rating: 4

24-hour reception

Smoke-free property

Heating

Terrace

All Spaces Non-Smoking (public and private)

General

Non-smoking rooms

Family room

Rooms

Restaurant

Meals

Free Wi-Fi

Internet access

Internet

Free parking

Parking nearby

Parking

Conference Hall

Business

Location

At the hotel

Sibiu Airport

Hotel Tara

Alba Iulia

LOCATION - facing a kind of highway and (abandoned?) industrial structures. Far from the centre enough to be dependent on the transports
CLEANLINESS: the bathroom missed some lights and shower was heavily damaged and blocked.
STAFF: inconsistent: asked for light-bulbs, shower drain solvent, information: answers elusive or straight no.
ATMOSPHERE: abandoned outskirts and quite sad furniture"

The only free hotel because of the long WE

For a start, don't believe the hotel's publicity, which claims the hotel is in a "quiet location". In fact it is on a major highway in a rather depressing industrial area, 2 km out of town. The train and bus stations are also 2 km out of town, but on the other side.

When we arrived, the receptionist, who was quite hard to find, as he doubled as a waiter and barman among other things, seemed to have no record of our booking. It is the first time we needed to produce our booking sheet from Booking.com to prove we had reserved a room. As we were early he asked us to come back at 12 noon and he would have a room for us. We could leave our bags behind the counter - a bit worrying as he was often not in attendance. No English was spoken here.

We asked about buses into town and were told there were none - only taxis. The staff at the train station had told us the same so we had taken a taxi to the hotel. In fact, we soon found there was a bus stop right outside the hotel. Any Line 16 bus will go directly to the bus station, which is next to the train station. Coming from the station, the word "Ambient" is shown on the front of the bus, and this is the stop you need, a big store directly opposite the hotel. Even if the drivers don't know Hotel Tara, they will definitely know Ambient.

We ate at the hotel's restaurant for lunch while we waited for our room, and it was quite satisfactory. When we checked in at noon we found the room was a bit odd as the beds were end to end rather than side by side. At least we had WiFi, cable TV and our own bathroom, for the same price as the bare hostel room we had in Bucharest. 

There were no towels in the room. When we asked them they indicated to wait a while, and eventually brought us towels that were still wet. We sent them back and we found dry towels waiting outside our door when we returned in the evening. The towel rack was broken and the shower was a bit hard to control, but there was plenty of hot water.

The staff did try to meet all our requests - when we could find them. We sometimes had to knock on the kitchen door to get some attention. We did succeed in getting a wake-up call in the morning, a point in their favour.

Our booking sheet from Booking.com said the hotel takes Visa card, but they insisted on cash. They also tried to charge more than we were quoted, so once again we had to show the printout of our booking details. 

We were surprised to find the breakfast, included in the room price, was pretty good. Two eggs each, sunnyside up, the first time we’ve had eggs for breakfast in Romania. It came with ham, salami and two types of cheese.  

Despite the lousy location and elusive staff, you may want to consider this hotel if you are on a budget, as there seem to be limited options in Alba Iulia. On the other hand, the old town is currently under heavy renovation, making the huge citadel difficult to explore, so it might be better to give the whole place a miss for a while.

Hotel Tara

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