Royal Hyde Park Hotel offers great value for a great location in Central London

When we were planning our trip to London, I looked through airbnb for apartments within our budget, in areas of London that I am familiar with and like, but that's like finding a needle in a haystack. We were lucky enough to find affordable accommodations in a great location through booking.com, and while the rooms were as small as a shoe box (just imagine you're in Japan) and very basic, the rooms were newly renovated and very clean.

We chose to stay at the Royal Hyde Park Hotel in the Queensway, Bayswater area. I'm fairly familiar with the area because we used to visit my aunt a lot during school summer holidays and she lived beside Royal Albert Hall, across Hyde Park from Bayswater.

The biggest challenge about our hotel is finding it.
They only have a doorway at street level.

Oh, and subsequently because of that, you need to lug your
luggage up 1 flight of stairs.

The lift only starts from the first floor - and Ground is 0.

But as I said, it's all about location, location, location and price - and our hotel came out to only GBP70 per night (around US$100) for twin sharing, breakfast included.

This was the view from our room.

You can even see Whiteley's if you look to the right, and let me say,
I even remember visiting Whiteley's from our summers in London.
(once we get sick of all the stores on Oxford St. and Kensington High St.)

The room is very basic, but not bad at all.

The bed is not too comfy, but after a 14.5 hour flight, it still felt pretty good.

They even made an effort with the towel origami. Parang HAL cruise lang.

The bathroom felt newly renovated and clean.

And I absolutely love heated towel racks.

The reception on the first floor is open 24/7.

Seems like mini cards have now replaced the flyer racks
from the old days. Just get what you want, some offer discounts.

The reception leads to the breakfast area where food is served from
7:30-9:30am, but water, coffee and tea is available any time.

Breakfast Area

Breakfast was not too bad, but it's the same everyday.

Day 1 (Day 2 and Day 4) breakfast.

I'd buy berries from the supermarket because they were really good
to munch on, or mixed in with yogurt.

On Sunday, we decided to treat ourselves to Full English Breakfast instead.
There are a lot of places that serve it along the street, but I wanted to eat
at Bayswater Arms which looked like it had better food and ambiance.

Full English Breakfast for Ady - hold the beans and replaced with a hash brown

I had the same but I asked for scrambled eggs instead. Yummy!
To trip to London is complete without having this!

Queensway, surprisingly, is like a Chinatown extension in London. As we were driving to our hotel, we passed a whole row of Chinese Restaurants. The interesting thing is, two of the restaurants here are quite famous - even in other countries.

On our first day in London, I was so happy when I realized that Four Seasons,
famous for the Boneless Roast Duck was just a few doors away.
Clearly, this is where Ady and I had dinner for Chinese New Year.

You can read my post on Four Seasons in Bangkok here, where we lined up for an hour to be seated, and my whole family loved the food.

Another restaurant that caught our attention, was Royal China because of the
long lines for Sunday Dimsum brunch. I'd bet my last dollar, this is the same
Royal China at Raffles - that I really enjoyed in Singapore.

You can read my post on Royal China at Raffles in Singapore here. In a way, I'm glad we didn't get to try it on this trip, because I can't wait to eat here when we go back, because I will definitely want to stay at the Royal Hyde Park Hotel again. just saying.

Royal Hyde Park Hotel

106-110 QUEENSWAY W2 3RR

http://www.magicstay.co.uk/Royal_Hyde_Park_Hotel

Note: I got a cheaper rate by booking directly through the hotel website