Chengdu Xanadu Hotel

Clean, comfortable, good location but not downtown. Cab fare from airport around 40 Yuan. To Jinli - 14-18 depending on traffic. Decor is nice, lobby is opulent but over the top - no one needs so many fake flowers and two young ladies with the sole purpose of standing by the door bowing to people all day. Service is great but almost no one speaks English. Everyone is friendly but they do not understand anything you're saying. There is one person on staff i met that could supposedly speak English but she was usually nowhere to be found and when i found her she was polite but almost as helpless as the rest of the staff. The check-in people spoke just enough to take your passport, credit card and tell you the price. Rooms are spacious and luxurious but you can see mild signs of wear on everything, including cigarette burns on conference room carpets. Vast breakfast selection but no decaf, limited fruit, absolutely no options for dietary restrictions. Also no one needs sushi for breakfast. Room service is good but massively overpriced and so is the mini bar. Good amenities - heated high tech toilet with bidet functions, separate shower and tub, huge bed albeit a bit too firm, TV with some English and Russian channels, desk, chairs, coffee and tea, a variety of toiletries, turndown service every other day, towels and toiletries every day, they even make your bed which is completely unnecessary; no iron. Absolutely absurd tech, and i mean ridiculous and not only in a good way. Curtains are tied to the lights - they cannot be open unless the lights are on. Once you press "sleep", good luck resetting the lights back to normal without restarting the system by pulling out the key. Elevators will let you push floor buttons to go to the lobby and the common floors they use for events. The elevator scans your card and automatically selects your floor. You cannot go to another floor, it's infuriating and ludicrous. So if you have friends or colleagues you came with but were given rooms on different floors, you cannot reach them and they cannot reach you, unless you are both present in the elevator or you have both key cards. It's fantastically poorly thought out. Also, the wifi is horrible and when available very unstable. If you have to do any work or access anything via VPN - it's hopeless. It's not a bad hotel by any means but it falls just short in every category. P.S. The same music everywhere in the hotel, it's charming in the beginning but it really gets on your nerves quickly after that.