We stayed for 3 nights. Our first room (on the lakeside) was pretty and a very good size but a little tired looking. Of more concern several lights didn't work, the sink was blocked, a curtain didn't close, the shower door didn't close, you'd need Arnold Schwarzneger to close the bathroom door, the floors were dirty (try wiping a damp tissue over them) and the transom window over the front door flooded the room with light from the hall all night. To compound matters the noise from the road is dreadful from about 4.30am. We moved after 2 nights to a room with a balcony opposite the Temple in order to watch the Perahera. This room (along with the others on this side I believe) was really too small to be comfortable for a family of 4 for more than 1 night (thankfully that's as long as we stayed), was again really decrepit and grubby looking, the balcony was dirty, the bathroom was dingy, and there was a lot of dust under the beds (I eventually worked out why my asthma got worse during our stay). Re the food whether western or Sri Lankan it was really pretty poor. A croque monsieur for one of the kids comprising a plastic bun, spam and a large blob of cheese was a particular lowlight. Euchhh!! Re service some of the staff tried and were kind, but on average we asked 3 times to get a bottle of water or tea in the restaurant or were left dangling at reception when we asked for help. Most questions in the restaurant led to someone wandering away never to be seen again - till we eventually worked out who could actually help us. The pool area was really awful and is perhaps the least well maintained area of the entire hotel, which at Queens is REALLY saying something. Sit back on your yellow and white chairs which look like they've been smeared with soot and stare at a bedraggled lime green wall or else a looming wall of peeling grey-white paint - really incredibly ugly. I think even my kids (2 and 6 years old) picked on the ambience as they spent next to no time in the pool unlike every other hotel we have been to. Unfortunately there was no games room hence nothing else for them to do inside the hotel instead. All in all this is the worst hotel I have been to in Sri Lanka (of between 70 to 100) and I am astonished that some reviewers thought it ok. Obviously it's opposite the Temple of the Tooth but I wouldn't subject myself to a night at Queens just to visit the former when I could take a taxi to it from any other hotel in and around Kandy. Interestingly a lot of reviewers have mentioned faded colonial grandeur etc, and whilst there's truth in that it's not often you see a wonderful deco bathtub desecrated by having an aluminium showerframe glued on to it! The only reason for staying here for 1 night in my mind is to watch the Perahera which is wonderful. The hotel is indescribably bad.
- Queens Hotel Kandy
