As we planned a cruise in Halong Bay we needed to find accommodation where we could also leave our luggage for a few days. The Hanoi Spring Hotel II handled this very well: without any charge we could leave most of our luggage in the hotel.

The hotel itself can be described as some another reviewer wrote: clean but basic. We stayed in the Honeymoon Suite with Cathedral view. The room was quite large and at some points we got the impression of a four star hotel like a nice comfortable bed, a LCD TV with a lot of interesting channels and very good breakfast (the restaurant is also open for non-guests).

But on the other hand some things of the hotel made it more like a two/three star hotel. The construction of the bath tap was weird. The tap was connected by a slightly rusted standard which could fall any second. Also the amount of warm water was limited. We found out the hard way. We learned to split up the shower time: one of us would have a shower in the evening and the other would have a shower in the morning. Also when we arrived there was a weird smell in the room; it turned out to be the AC which was on maximum heat.
The view of the room was good. We are used to church bells and while the bell was ringing quite regularly (like every hour) it was so not disturbing. Actually it added a little to the ambiance.

The (hardworking) staff was usually very helpful and most of them understood English well enough. As a small present on the first night there was a pie for our honeymoon and a bottle of wine. In the hotel it is possible to book tours. As we already had booked everything before we did not make use of it.

All in all if you are on a budget we can recommend the hotel but be aware that you are in backpacker’s /tourist area. We did not feel safe at all during night time and during day time we constantly had to be aware. We got really annoyed at one point of the lack of walkway and the traffic constantly honking at you. Of course the hotel cannot change this but it is enough for us not to return here and if we return to Hanoi at all we would book a hotel in the area where for example The Mövenpick hotel is.

The hotel does not have an elevator so if you have trouble walking stairs better ask for a room on the first floor or look somewhere else. The room we stayed in was on the top of the building which meant walking eight stairs every time. We were not bothered by this and the staff in the hotel makes sure you do not have to carry your luggage all the way: they will do it for you.

While our stay in the hotel was ok the day of departure was not so good. The evening before we asked for a private driver to bring us to the airport. We paid 15 USD for this; expensive for Hanoi but we really had enough of all the dishonest taxi drivers.

When we departured it looked like the hotel forgot about us ordering a private car. Instead we had to wait and suddenly there was a taxi. This was not what we agreed about but as we were late we had no choice otherwise we would miss our flight. The driver was scary: he looked constantly at us as he was waiting for us to fall asleep or so. Perhaps we were paranoid but if someone looks ten times a minute in his mirror you do not feel so comfortable.

Finally we arrived at the airport. The taxi stopped at the start of the terminal. There were no luggage carts so one of us had to get one for all our suit cases. The driver did not want to drop us further on the terminal and really did not care for us or our luggage. When one of us finally had found a cart and walked back the taxi already left and basically had thrown all of our luggage on the street. We wanted to avoid this and that is why we asked the hotel a private driver in the first place. We felt the hotel should have “screened” the driver/company before letting some of their guests use it or give us what we asked before in the first place.

Stayed here with on and off for a month and loved it. The breakfast was excellent. There was a wide variety of options to choose from and the juice was always fresh. The hotel staff loved practicing English with all of us and was willing to help us with anything we needed (getting minutes for cell phones, directions, and calling taxis).

We stayed at this excellent hotel on our first trip to Vietnam. It has all the advantages you always look for: great location (beside the cathedral, at the Old Quarter, 5 min from the lake), good price, tidy, clean and big rooms, tasty breakfast and great staff. Airport pick-up is free and they can arrange everything for you (taxis, water puppet show tickets, Halong Bay Cruise Tours, etc). They arranged all these for us and everything went just perfect. Calypso Cruise at Halong Bay was great! Ms Tran and all the staff are always willing to help.
We would definitely stay here when in Hanoi.

Arriving late into Hanoi, the driver was there to collect us from airport as promised. Our welcome at hotel wasn't as warm or as helpful as we'd hoped for but it was late at night...staff during the day were of more help. Our double standard room was clean and spacious, albeit on the top floor. Breakfast was very nice - the chicken pho was amongst the best we tasted in VN! And you can't beat the location - on a nice, quiet street, very convenient for exploring the city on foot. Worth also checking out Le Place cafe just a few doors down - food and fruit smoothies are excellent.