Well, this was impromtu.
Such was the joy of knowing the fuss-free re-opening of land borders to Malaysia that we woke up at 5am to leave for a last-min trip to the land of gula melaka. The planned 1-nighter also made DoubleTree an impractical option (and too expensive) to explore the streets, so Ibis it was. I admit I was a little apprehensive about an older Ibis property especially when the state of maintenance is unknown but onwards we went!
Address – 249 Jalan Bendahara, 75100 Melaka, Malaysia. Website.
Contact – Tel: +60 6-222 8888. Email: H9101@accor.com.
Location – The property is actually quite centrally located! The very brown building sticks out amongst the row of low shophouses along the streets of the city, with its iconic red logo marking its spot very well. A 5-10min brisk (but unsheltered walk) will take you to Jonker Street where all tourists have to be. Otherwise there are only random local shops with an interesting cluster of Indian shops and eateries surrounding the hotel. There is also a 7-11 along the way to Jonker if that’s useful.
Price – $74++ = $85nett booked for a Standard Room with 2 single beds under their Flexible Rate, Bed & Breakfast which was as decent as you can get especially when I am booking it only when leaving for Malaysia.
Check In – After snagging a spot at the on-site parking which is complimentary for in-house guests, we arrived at the empty lobby at 9:30am on a weekend. Early I know, but anyhows proceeded to the front desk anyways. The staff who attended to me seemed untrained about elite benefits and simply asked us to come back as the room will only be ready at 2-3pm. After heading out for some breakfast, we ended up back at the hotel at 11am and I approached the front desk again with a screenshot of my benefits to ask how early can the ‘early check in’ benefit be accorded, as well as complimentary upgrade – a seemingly more senior staff acknowledged the conversation and 30mins later, I was informed that the room is ready and that I’ve been upgraded to a Suite. Yays!
I was also given a voucher for 2x welcome drinks which can be redeemed for coffee, tea, or juices at their restaurant Ibis Kampung before I check out. I was quietly impressed that this was given at an Ibis!
Room – My Suite with Queen Bed (35SqM), 304, was located at the far end of a red meandering corridor and the door opened up to a surprisingly clean and spacious space which exceeded my expectations!
It was clean – no sticky floors, no dusty surfaces! (yes, I know that should be a hotel basic but we all know that it does not happen these days).
The spacious angular layout managed to contain alot of furniture! On one end of the room is a cushy queen bed, 2 bedside tables with 3-pin powerpoints + lighting controls, a single loungey chair + ottoman + coffee table + A desk space for misc stuff.
On the other end of the room is a sofa bed, a TV (with quality and channel selection just passable), a mini bar, an empty fridge, and a open-concept wardrobe containing (very thin) bedroom slippers. I even got a welcome note which was a pleasant surprise!
The bathroom area is surprisingly clean as well – with a small single sink, toilet and a separate standing shower space. For toiletries, there is only a single pump dispenser for everything you need for a shower so bring your own if you are picky (I did). There are also very basic amenities so again, BYO.
Breakfast – served at their restaurant Ibis Kitchen Restaurant from 7:00am-10:00am, the space was peppered with guests leisurely eating their food as we stepped in at 8am.
Breakfast is served buffet style and staff will pass you disposable gloves to don when taking food. The spread is very basic typical and you’ll see ham, cheese, fruits, cereal, noodles, rice, sausage, curry chicken etc, accompanied by an egg station. The quality was quite bad so thank goodness for eggs cooked to order. Coffee was really bad too – so I redeemed my welcome drinks for proper fresh coffee which was at least decent.
Facilities – I never expected an Ibis to have a pool AND gym so floated by to check it out. Both located on the ground floor and accessible via a backdoor of sorts leading out to a separate space behind the main building, they are basic but I never expected anything fancy too.
Check Out – I did an express checkout at 10:00am in the morning so fuss-free.
In Summary,
I’m really glad about my choice and it surpassed my expectations of an Ibis though I did not expect the crappy breakfast. But for the price, its really okay for a decently clean room in a kind-of-central location for exploring the small town.