After spending a night in Richmond to take advantage of the StayRichmond promo, I relocated to the 434 room Vancouver Marriott Pinnacle Downtown Hotel. While I was hoping that this hotel would be a bit of a gem, it was exceedingly disappointing.
Insert city name here Marriott
Booking
I choose the Vancouver Marriott Pinnacle because of its central downtown location on East Hastings Street, it’s not far from Gastown, Stanley Park, and the ferry terminal to North Vancouver.
Although it was downtown, it is located a bit in no-mans land when it comes to transit, as it’s about a 10-minute walk away from the nearest subway stations.
Rates have started to creep up at this hotel
I could have booked this hotel using 50K Marriott Bonvoy points, but as I value those points at about 1 CPP, it was a much better deal to pay $180 a night instead.
Checking In
I checked in to the room around noon and was met with the monotone business interior of the Marriott namesake brand, needless to say, this brand hasn’t aged well. I checked in with the front desk, who was rather cold and formal. I was upgraded to a harbour view room, which was nice, and was the highest room that was in service at the time of my stay.
While checking in, I did notice that there were several international airline flight crews in the lobby. I noticed KLM (pictured) who were hanging out in the lobby WITHOUT MASKS instead of going right onto their bus to the airport, and a FedEx crew who weren’t even wearing masks. Although Marriott has a North American wide mandatory masks in all places, they did not enforce it, as noted by other travel bloggers. It was frustrating to see that these people who are coming from out of the country be violating the mask rules that are in place.
KLM flight attendant, not wearing a mask, in the Lobby of the hotel
The Room
The room was straight out of the mid-2000s, as to be expected from the Marriott brand and a hotel built-in 2000. There was a king-size bed and two ugly uncomfortable burgundy chairs. There was also a desk with a comfy chair, something I can see myself spending hours at if I was on a travel project for my day job.
There was a Keurig coffee machine and a 42 inch flat screen TV.
The best part of the hotel is the view over the harbour. I’m not going to lie, I did spend some time watching planes taking off and land.
At least the view was awesome
The bathroom was simple, although there was still a tub, which many of the new business hotels don’t seem to have these days. Do people even use them? The bathroom has thisworks beauty products provided when I checked in, unlike at the Westin Wall Centre Vancouver Airport.
The Breakfast
As a Marriott Bonvoy Elite member, I am entitled to breakfast for two in the lounge, or case that the lounge is closed, in the restaurant. It’s almost always better to eat in the restaurant, as the food is generally served to order.
As the lounge was closed (and is still closed at publishing, updates available here), we ate at the Showcase restaurant, which was without a doubt the best experience at this hotel. Although the restaurant was understaffed, the servers were friendly and went out of their way to help. That being said, there were multiple groups of people that didn’t treat the staff very well (the same people who showed up without a mask) and it was a bit disheartening to see. The food was good and we were happy that there was some upside to staying at this specific property.
Facilities
Overall, this hotel is showing that it’s 20 years old, as almost everything feels like it hasn’t been updated since then. The gym was adequate, but I can imagine that it could get quite busy in normal times.
The pool has some nice natural light, but it was showing its age.
Just beyond the pool was a deck that was rusted out and overall gross looking, kind of a symbol of the hotel as a whole.
There was also a business centre, which at least had updated computers. That being said, I’m almost surprised that they have Apple computers instead of PCs.
The Point.
Overall, the Vancouver Marriott Pinnacle Downtown Hotel is a miss for a tourist. The hotel is bland, the facilities are showing age, and if the lounge is open, you don’t even get to experience the wonderful staff in the restaurant. While the restaurant staff were enforcing social distancing, the front desk staff were not enforcing masks, as evidenced by theInternational flight attendants in the lobby without a mask. Next time I’m in town, I’ll stay at the Sheraton Wall Centre.
