During my recent stay at the Monarque Hotel I received probably the most personally interested experience I have ever received in my life. It was remarkable.

OVERVIEW

First, to give a brief overview, this is a 4 star hotel marketed at a similar level to quite a few hotels in the area. It has floors numbered up to 12, which has a rooftop swimming pool and bar. The breakfast offering is good, fresh and varied. The breakfast restaurant is not huge but they fit a great selection in and it never feels cramped. This hotel also offers afternoon tea from 2-5pm daily. As the name suggests, you can have unlimited tea, coffee, cakes and sandwiches. Very pleasant. This distinguishes it from other hotels in the area.

AREA

You are right on the beach. There are many seafood restaurants, other hotels, bars, cafes, etc. in the area. The foreign language infrastructure is therefore atypically good for those who can speak English (and to a slightly lesser degree for those who speak Korean. I am a pretty competent foreign speaker of Korean so a good judge I think - there are many Korean-friendly businesses in the area, which makes sense given Korea provides probably the single largest number of tourists to this hotel and district).

It's essentially a straight line west to the airport, across the famous Cao Rong (correct spelling?) / Dragon Bridge. You can even do it as a walk in just over an hour (if you just have a backpack - I don't recommend crossing the road in Vietnam when you are pulling a suitcase).

The famous My Khe beach extends about 1 hour's walk to the north and at least 5-6 hours' walk to the south (right down to the beach resorts at the river delta just downsteam from Hoi An). It is continuous sandy beach all the way, which makes for some spectacular photos. The section of the beach the Monarque Hotel is on is about the most 'developed' part with lots of waterside parks, businesses, etc. It is busy but 10-20 minutes' walk in either direction takes you to a comparatively quiet part of the beach.

ROOMS

The rooms are spacious and the better classes of rooms have large oval/circular bathtubs. There is a slightly old-fashioned, classic design style with a lot of wood that I really like. It is not soulless like the uniform style adopted by a lot of hotels. I had a great view onto the beach, though to give fair warning most rooms don't have this. But the beach is right there, so why not just cross the road and walk along it if you don't get a room with a view? The mattresses and pillows are comfortable and the curtains keep out the light effectively. The minibar and hotel dining / spa services are very reasonably priced (given this is a hotel).

In addition to standard housekeeping, there is a daily turndown service where you will be given cookies and a little goodnight message on a card, which is cute (though I think this is a great missed opportunity for the hotel to vary the message with various night-themed poems etc. each day, rather than distribute the exact same card daily - just a suggestion!).

STAFF

Now for the staff. I want to give particular thanks to Flora, who came to pick me up with a colleague from the airport (this being a perk of being a 'VIP' which seems to be earned just through a long stay of a particular length - bear in mind I only stayed 9 nights). She also called the Grab cab that took me back to the airport at the end of my stay and waved me off. You could say that she was with me throughout.

From the start, Flora impressed me. She and her colleague had to wait about an extra hour due to my flight landing late and passport control at the airport being very slow. I was profusely sorry but she was not upset at all, and we had a great chat about language learning on our way to the hotel.

She took personal interest in my stay throughout and always made sure to check how I was doing, offer suggestions for things to do, and generally just chat with me. Incredibly, she is very junior and very new to this work, which you would not know at all given how confident, assured and able she is in all the work she does. If you stay at this hotel, be sure to look out Flora. She will definitely improve your stay with her natural charm and energy. If you don't believe just look at who keeps getting mentioned in the last 3-4 months of Google reviews for this hotel... !

I also want to take an opportunity to thank Sophia for the fun conversations during afternoon tea. Another very positive, outgoing and sincerely interested staff member. It was a joy to speak with her.

But really all of the staff are great - very sincerely interested, positive and helpful. This attitude is maintained at all levels and at all times. There is never a moment where you feel that anyone is being insincere or does not want to talk to and help you.

There are many similar hotels in this area, so if you are trying to work out which one to pick, I suggest you go for this one on the basis of the staff as the differentiating factor. Like I say, not even as a member with loyalty status at big hotel chains have I received the kind of dedicated, personal service that I received at the Monarque Hotel. It's a no brainer, really.