Citadines Apart'Hotel Marseille Prado Chanot

( 3 stars , Marseille , France )

We have stayed at Citadines aparthotels before, together in Paris (Montmartre… very nice place, see our review) and one of us has stayed at one in London, so we booked this with no hesitation, the pictures of the building with balconies giving onto a grass garden looked good (same pictures as on this site). Location was awful: in between 2 metro stations, far from the old port and from the beaches, we made good use of the 3-day transport passes we bought. The area is not interesting, just a couple of cafés/restaurants. The street it's on is grubby and also includes a hospital, a fire station and an unemployment office. Fortunately, neither ambulances nor fire engines made too much of a noise. We had asked for a 2-room apartment with balcony, garden side. Although we did get the apartment, the view was of the parking, some abandoned warehouses and construction sites. In the far background, we did see some nice mountains which provided a suitable Provence sunset view. The reception area is clean and cool. Breakfast is available, but we didn't try it. Reception is closed at night. The apartment itself was small, the décor uninspiring at best. There was a sitting area and a separate bedroom, an entrance/kitchen, a bathroom, a separate toilet and a balcony and the air-conditioning worked, even with the full sun and heat of the day. The furniture and decor had seen better days, in particular the sofa in the living room, which was covered in brown leather-look plastic which was torn. The double bed was not comfortable and made my back ache in the mornings. Flooring was lino… I have not seen flooring like that in a 3* hotel before. The loo looked terrible. The balcony was grubby and small with ugly plastic furniture. The common areas were … common. All in all, it was sort of OK… we ate there a few times, on the balcony, slept there, but the longer we stayed away from it the better we felt. In a better location, we may not have been so critical of the place, but a 3* it is not. TV channels... only BBC World and CNN in English. There are much better located places to stay in Marseille… We will not go back to this place.