First time in Thunder Bay with plans to visit the nearby provincial parks. The hotel was conveniently located along a strip of various restaurants, gas stations, and other amenities, so it was easy to stock up on whatever might be needed.
However, a warning of sorts: The hotel is right across from the airport. Because of the COVID situation, there weren't many comings and goings of planes and I'm not one to be sensitive to those sorts of external sounds anyways. But to someone who is sensitive to noise (and perhaps once COVID dies down), this may not be the location for you as I could clearly hear the planes taking off from my hotel room.
Checking in was straight forward, though the person behind the counter seemed tired or emotionless. They were not rude at all, but they didn't come across as welcoming. Perhaps a bad day? Just tired?
The room was a decent size with a closet -- an external one, which was interesting, but certainly nothing to complain about. The room was certainly a good size, as was the bathroom. That said, a couple of key problems:
1) The king size bed had only 2 small pillows on it -- so small, in fact, that I thought there was a mistake and somehow they forgot to add pillows to the bed. There were no additional pillows in the closet(??) so I found myself having to call down to ask for pillows. The front desk seemed to be put off by this request for some reason. That said, he did arrive promptly with extra pillows -- actually labelled as being extra pillows right on the pillow cases! They were very flat and barely qualified as pillows.
2) The air conditioner was so loud, I'm not sure if it was broken or meant to be that way. I didn't bother to ask for it to be checked out, mostly due to COVID concerns and wanting to limit contact. It was manageable, but again, I'm not so sensitive to noise. If in fact that's how it normally sounds, then some people will for sure have difficulty in sleeping there.
3) The toilet became clogged after I used it. I won't say anything more about it, but I will say that this is the only experience I've ever had seeing a hotel toilet become clogged with 'normal use'.
On the positive side, there were plenty of charging and electrical outlets -- very handy given I have a CPAP machine, my laptop, my phone, and so on. The view was lovely, and the room was quite clean and roomy. I slept comfortably.
I'm unsure if I'd stay there again given the concerns I had, though. less
Stuarttbay, General Manager at Best Western Thunder Bay Crossroads, responded to this review
Thank you for staying with us.
We are conveniently located close to the airport, which can cause some noise issues. I am not sure if your room was in the front or back of the hotel. ( the back is quieter)
Due to Covid19 we were forced to make a number of changes.
We would normally have had 4 pillows on each bed, with extra in the closet. We were told by head office to limit the pillows to 2 per bed, as well as to remove extra decorative elements/paper/pens, guest books, and other items that could be touched by a covid carrying guest and not easily disinfectant.
Due to concerns, we now have 4 pillows on a king bed We hope that we will soon be allowed to resume our hot breakfast buffet. as well. Currently we are only allowed ( Provincial Regulation) to serve a breakfast bag.