At this point in the third week of November, it looks like we will indeed have spent the whole of 2020 in Singapore and not having stepped out for any kind of travel. At the start of 2020, we’d booked for an 8 day trip in June to Penang, and wrote up a tentative itinerary for another two weeks in Japan come December. Those plans got tossed out of the window when Covid 19 struck. Credit has to go to the government here though for recognising early that the lack of travel options out of Singapore in turn also meant providing opportunities for locals to take holidays and do sight-seeing within the island. The Prime Minister in fact even encouraged Singaporeans to take staycations. We booked a four day June staycation that ended up getting postponed to December when restrictions didn’t start to get lifted until late June.
It’s November now and we’re finally at the first of our two staycations this year: our 14th anniversary staycation at Orchard Rendezous Hotel. Like much of what we write about in this blog’s travel posts, we’re not really inclined to pay through our noses for expensive accommodation stays, preferring to keep our expenditure modest. So, comments for our one weekend night stay at this property!
Orchard Rendezvous Hotel sits at the far end of Orchard Road, and by far also the quietest stretch of the long retail district, though also somewhat opposite the infamous Orchard Tower, quipped to be Singapore’s hidden red light district. Our stay had complimentary parking, and the hotel has a multi-story car park that sits in an adjacent building in the compound. The car park can be accessed from two roads: Google Maps will suggest getting to the hotel via Cuscaden Road, but we drove in by taking Tomlinson then Tanglin roads. Either entrances to the car park will work, and the entrance from Tanglin road is just past the hotel lobby’s drop-off point and on the left. Do drive carefully though, as the multi-story car park has sharp 90 degree turns at every juncture. And also adding to the challenge are the somewhat narrow parking lots.
We got to the hotel right when many guests were checking in at around 2:15PM-ish, so the not especially spacious reception area felt a little crowded. Nonetheless, there were sufficient staff manning the various check-in rows. And a short wait later, we were brought to and shown to our room on the tenth level.
First impressions? The hotel exterior facade feels very 1990-ish, but the interiors look like they were recently refurbished maybe 4-5 years ago. We were in a Deluxe-category room, and flooring was dark brown parquet, with a large rug where the bed is. The room also opens up to a small balcony with a decent view of the swimming pool, and the low density and expensive landed properties of the Tanglin area.
The room itself is fairly minimalist though, and comprises of what looks like a mix of older furniture – e.g. the night tables and work table – that has seen better days (e.g. chips around the edges of the night tables), incorporated with more modern fittings in the bathroom and also TV console. There was a small selection of 3-in-1 type beverages, but the mini-fridge itself was bereft of the usual paid snacks and drinks.
The room at least was otherwise very clean, and the floor of the shower stall sits roughly an inch lower than the rest of the toilet floor – i.e. there’s no risk of water spillage from the stall itself. The air-con temperature in the room was also on overdrive mode. When set to the lowest fan speed and least cool temperature, the room still felt chilly!
As with properties along Orchard Road, there’s an abundance of options for dining and retail, including The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf just beside the hotel, and a Starbucks just across the road. There’s also a well-regarded Hakata Ramen joint but we were so stuffed from the buffet lunch we had at Spice Brasserie that we didn’t check that out for dinner.
This has been our twelfth staycation. Looking back, the most luxurious property we’ve stayed at remains Capella Sentosa, but the rate there these days numbers into the four digit sums per night. Of the more recent stays, I’ll put this one roughly in the bracket of M Hotel Singapore, Holiday Inn Express Singapore Orchard Road and Furama RiverFront – alright stays in a somewhat dated property and nothing especially special or particularly memorable about it. Our next staycation will be in mid-December and at almost directly opposite Orchard Renezvous Hotel – Orchard Hotel, which if Tripadvisor ratings are anything to go by, a much better rated property.. Either way, more to come in a month!
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