Crowne Plaza Ningbo City Center Review

The Crowne Plaza Ningbo City Center isn't misleading you with their name - indeed it is right at the heart of the Ningbo City Center. Check-in was a bit lengthy but a few words of English were spoken - much to my delight.

The hotel occupies two 19 floor towers in the middle of the city. The hotel is clearly a few decades old but seemed clean and well run. I received an upgrade to a Deluxe room which was indeed much bigger and came with a sofa lounge chair next to the bed. The bathroom was pretty enormous.

 

The beds was in perfect condition and the mattress the perfect mix of hard and soft. So fare all boxes ticked. As with hotel stays in China the air conditioning was mostly loud but not able to provide much cool air it would barely go below 78 degrees.

My other pet peeve of my Chinese hotel stays was the slow Internet. The hotel provides dedicated routers in each room for optimal WiFi connection but the backend connection was slow - usually topping out at 2 MBIT much below the brand standard of 10 Mbit.

I used the gym at the 5th floor which was a decent shape - it covered all the basics. There is also an outdoor swimming pool.

 

The breakfast featured a big spread of items - mostly Asian plus fresh made eggs. I wasn't really happy with the choices though and had a hard time finding some high quality items.

 

The Crowne Plaza Ningbo features an Executive lounge but breakfast is currently not served at the lounge. There is a Happy Hour though and I found the food items to be quite good.

 

There were plenty of alcoholic drinks on offer as well.

The lounge was mostly quiet and provided a lovely view over the town of Ningbo.

In sum this hotel is solid. Friendly staff, good hardware and decent food. I wish the Internet would be more usable and the air conditioning would be less noisy and more effective.