Hotel de l'Europe - Amsterdam, Holland: Situated with a beautiful view of the Amstel River sits Hotel de l'Europe, a five-star, 100 room hotel.

First Impression/Lobby: Hotel de l'Europe is an impressive looking hotel from the outside and just as pretty from the inside. As I walked into the hotel I had high hopes for this five-star hotel, unfortunitly my hopes were far from met.

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Reception: The best part of the Hotel de l'Europe was Reception. After a long overnight flight, the warm, sincere welcome and being able to check into our room early, was just what we needed.

The Suite: The Senior Suite is huge. It consists of decent sized bedroom, a separate living room and dining area as well as a large balcony that offers beautiful views of Amstel River. The décor of the suite is tired and worn. The carpet is in terrible condition and the furnishings are what I would expect to see at a three star hotel. The suite has a fake fireplace, which adds to the character and potential to the room, but even with that, the room lacks what you would expect from a beautiful gem of an old hotel like this. The suite also has a mini-kitchenette with a stove top and small refrigerator. If you are unlucky, as we were, it comes stocked with half-consumed bottles of water and a left over soda and beer from a previous guest.

The bedroom, as I had mentioned, is decent sized. Again, if you are as unlucky as we were, your king sized bed will come complete with a foot-sized hole in the duvet cover, discretely hidden on the underside of it (easily found once you are in bed and your foot becomes tangled in it) and some of the lumpiest, horrible pillows I had ever seen. I think they must have come with the initial purchase of the hotel. Hopefully, you will not want to use the large vanity mirror in the bedroom, as the lights for it do not work

The large marble bathroom is very nice with its dual twin sinks and separate shower, toilet and bathtub. As a word of caution though, you may want conserve your washcloths, hand towels and soaps, none were consistently replaced.

It was sad to see this potentially gorgeous suite be so poorly cared for, it really could be bombastic.

Room Service: The food, which comes out of the same kitchen as the hotel's restaurant, Restaurant Excelsior, is excellent. However, the Hotel de l'Europe, which has 100 guest rooms, only had one person working in room service. In my opinion and as was evident, it is impossible for one person provide good room service for a hotel this large.

When I called, actually having someone answer the room service telephone took numerous attempts. Normally calls went unanswered and on one occasion, when I did reach the young woman from room service, she was about to deliver an order. As she took my call, the other order apparently sat waiting.

When my order was about to be delivered (she rang the bell and by the time I answered the door, she was on the phone) it sat in the hallway outside my door for over five minutes as she attended to another caller. Needless to say, my dinner was late and she simply wanted to drop the order and run to the orders that were backing up. She did not even offer to remove the dinners from the warmer, let alone set the table. Imagine having the Senior Suite with a separate dining table but choosing to eat off the room service cart. This is not five-star service.

Restaurant: Restaurant Excelsior, the hotel's fine dining restaurant is bombastic. Read the full review.

Concierge: Concierge service at Hotel de l'Europe was as you would expect, professional with consistently good recommendations.

Overall Impression Disappointing, not only in the hotel's worn and aged appearance of the suite but more so in the service. Even after talking with two different managers, nothing changed. Hotel de l'Europe is a member of the Leading Hotels of the World but by no means is it a leading hotel, that is, unless you are looking for a leader of poor service and tired accommodations.

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