Meroddi Galata Mansion

If you are European, you know the sizes of room and toilets. This is no different. Location is good. 10min walk to station. However, hotel is located at hight. You will need taxi for luggage and also I don’t think they lifts, but bellboy kindly bought our luggage to our room. We were early from a long flight and manager not only let us have early checkin but also offered us breakfast. Absolutely gem.

TERRIBLE hotel with bad hygiene and unprofessional management, AVOID at all costs! First, I had to wait for 1 hour to check in, because it turns out that the hotel does not have a 24-hr receptionist (even though this is not mentioned while booking). The room I got at the end of the 1-hr wait was a room in the attic, where you could not open a window and the air freshener was left on. The freshener smell was so intense that you couldn’t breathe. This must have been the room with sewer smell and mold from the other bad reviews, undergoing a terrible attempt to hide the smell. Upon my request, the staff switched me to another room with inside-facing “windows” (so still no fresh air). This second room had so many flies all over the bed (see photo) and the bathroom that it was disgusting and inhabitable! So again, I asked for another room. This would now be a street-facing room, and the night staff insisted that I would have to pay a price difference for this room, completely ignoring the fact that I was only switching due to the horrible state of the first two rooms! I was supposed to pay the next morning during my checkout, but the morning staff showed some mercy and did not charge me for the “room upgrade.” There is absolutely no soundproofing in the hotel, you would hear every sound from the street loudly in the street-facing room—but hey, this one was at least flyless. There was hair on the towels in the bathroom. Also, stray cats are allowed to roam the hotel freely, which already tells you how seriously they take cleaning here. The AC in the room was super dusty. Don’t be fooled by the breakfast buffet offering, the pastries weren’t fresh at all and some of the packaged cheese/yogurts were ON their expiration date. Don’t book this hotel for the sake of the good location, there are plenty of better hotels nearby. The staff of the cafe part of the hotel were empathetic and apologetic during this whole mess. I appreciate their efforts but they obviously cannot make up for the terrible state and management of the hotel.

Overwhelming smell of sewage in the room, triggered a severe headache and asthma. Chemical “fix” made it worse. Staff entered without notice. Bottom floor reeked of cat urine. We left for our own safety. No response from hotel or Booking.com. Not as advertised. Unsafe. Stay far away.