Last year when our parents turned 60, my sister and I were thinking about what we should give them as a present. As my mother dropped several times how she would love it to visit Canada one day to visit our cousin living there, we decided to gift them the plane tickets to Canada and invite ourselves along for the trip. In about one and a half week we made a trip around the cities in central-eastern Canada, visiting Montreal, Quebec, Ottawa and Toronto.

After landing at Montreal’s Trudeau Airport and a smooth entry into Canada we hopped into a ‘Bonjour‘ taxi to take us to our hotel for the night, the InterContinental Montreal.

The hotel is located in between the old town and the modern city centre integrated into the World Trade Centre, right across the street from Palais des Congrès de Montréal.

The lobby is located on the first floor, one level up from the street entrance using escalators. On the same first floor there is also located the bar, the restaurant and the club lounge. The fitness, pool and rooms are all located floors 10 and above as the floors between 1 and 10 are used as office spaces.

At check-in we were assisted by a woman which seemed to be having a bad day and did not really make us feel very welcome. We were assigned a room on the 23^rd floor, overlooking the square in front of the hotel. We also received a welcome letter and some discount coupons to use in the bar and restaurants of the hotel as well as a voucher for two complimentary cocktails in the bar.

The room itself was a pretty standard affair with two double beds just as I had booked, the Ambassador “upgrade” was just a higher floor with a better view. There is a chaise-longue located at the window, and a desk in between both beds. Opposite the beds there is a closet with a wall mounted TV above it.

In the closet under the TV there is a Keurig coffeemaker as well as a minibar. 2 complimentary bottles of water are provided in the room, replenished daily.

 

As a birthday surprise for my parents a small birthday cake was delivered to the room.

The bathroom was very spacious, offering both a bath tub and a shower.

 

The fixed showerhead in the shower was located quite low, hanging around the height of my shoulders, making it difficult to properly shower.

The amenities where the usual Agraria ones.

As the room was prepared for only two persons there were only two towels of each size, two bathrobes and one set of slippers.

When I called the front desk for more towels, bathrobes and slippers on the first night only the extra towels where delivered. After coming back to our room in the evening of our second night, once again the cleaning staff only provided towels for two persons and I once again had to contact front desk to get more towels and the desired bathrobes and slippers, luckily this time they did bring the slippers and bathrobes along with the towels.

I get that as most people only book this room for a two-person occupancy that it is standard prepared for two persons only, but I would expect that on the second night the staff is briefed about the occupancy by four persons of the room and the room is stocked accordingly. Also having to ask twice for the extra bathrobes and slippers to be delivered while promised after the first time is disappointing.

Of course as we had arrived from a long-haul flight we liked to get the airplane stiffness out of our bodies and we headed for the pool on the 10^th floor. It is located next to the small but well equipped fitness area.

There is a small welcome desk near the door where you can get towels to use in the pool area. The pool itself is a small flight of stairs up and is located on the top of the smaller building alongside the main hotel tower.

It has a pretty big size for a hotel pool and a view over the square in front of the hotel. There also seemed to be some kind of outdoor terrace but it did not seem to have been used in a long time. In the pool area there were also some floats available to ‘play’ with in the pool. There were no signs of a sauna or a Jacuzzi anywhere near though.

In the morning breakfast was served in the Osco! Restaurant, located on the first floor next to the lobby. As we booked a rate with breakfast included we just went to the restaurant and assumed that we would be ticked off on a list as is usual in hotels.

When we were welcomed to be seated the lady behind the desk asked us for our breakfast coupons, apparently in Canada the hotels issue out coupons to the people that have their breakfast paid in advance, but we did not have any. So off to the front desk to enquire about that, apparently the lady checking us I the night before ‘forgot’ to gives us the breakfast coupons, luckily the man manning the desk this morning was much friendlier and issued the breakfast coupons immediately so we could enjoy breakfast.

The breakfast was served in a buffet style, but hot drinks and orange juice where delivered to your table.

There was a good offering on the buffet, with certain items being rotated on a daily basis. There was a nice hot spread with the usual scrambled eggs, sausage and bacon but also some local egg/bacon/cheese dish, either American pancakes or crepes drenched in maple syrup and of course an egg station to have your omelette made to order.

 

The fresh part of the buffet was also quite big, with some very delicious fruit salads on offer.

Of course there were also some cheese and cold cuts on offer as well as a wide bakery offer. Next to the usual bread and viennoiseries you also had bagels, which changed variety on a daily basis. The taste and quality of the offer was very good and one of the better hotel breakfast spreads I have had.

 

To finish off our stay in Montreal we visited the Sarah B. cocktail bar in the hotel on the last evening, to use our coupon for two complimentary cocktails. They had a very nice cocktail menu and we enjoyed our generously sized cocktails very much.

I was slightly disappointed by my stay at the InterContinental Montreal, having stayed at different InterContinental properties before I was used to them offering a higher standard.

With the issues of not having sufficient towels, bathrobes and slippers as well as not receiving our breakfast coupons we felt like they were not delivering a very professional operation.

The hotel itself has a wonderful location and offers everything to be an exquisite product, it’s just up to the hotel to polish up their rough edges and make sure there is a seamless experience without people like me having to contact the front desk on three separate occasions to just get things right.

Would I recommend staying there? I’m not sure, if they offer a good price/quality ratio they do offer a good location and hard product but I would not go out of my way to stay at the property.

Have you been disappointed at your hotel experience before? If yes, what happened? Let us know in the comments below!