My wife and I celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary, opting for a weekend flight and relaxing stay in Napa to celebrate. For more than a year, I saved my Hyatt points to celebrate in style - and chose Andaz Napa because it's a category 6 hotel that uses words like "relax", "retreat" and "unwind" on the front page of its website.
58,000 Hyatt points was a lot of points for two nights - but we considered it a splurge to celebrate our anniversary away from kids, in style and to relax.
Sunday was our day to truly unplug. We started with a recommended lunch at Auberge du Soliel, followed by a stop at a winery and a croissant at Bouchon Bakery in Yountville. Knowing we had a 6:30pm reservation at Bottega, we decided we'd splurge for an unheard of treat - a quiet afternoon back at Andaz to take advantage of the relaxation, retreat and unwind we'd looked forward to.while we collected our 58,000 points.
Around 3pm, we walked back into our hotel room 239 to find our housekeeper finishing serving our room. She was great. She quickly finished sprucing up our bathroom and left. That's when we realized the situation.
In room 239, our window looked out on the terrace where a loud party was underway.
And loud is an understatement.
Less than 20 feet from my pillow was one of the speakers blaring music for a party. I laid down, trying to sleep. It was impossible. After a while, I grabbed my phone and downloaded a decibel meter app. It showed that, from my pillow, the sound varied between 74 and 86 decibels. It said that's the volume of a vacuum cleaner.
After more than an hour of frustration, I grabbed my phone again in an attempt to alert the hotel to our situation. On the front page of the Hyatt app is an icon to "Text the Hotel". I clicked the button and was taken to the text app - and to a number that I know works because I got a text from the hotel Saturday when our room was ready for us.
At 5:02pm, I sent a text to that number, describing our situation, hoping someone would contact us to ask us how they could make the situation better.
No one ever replied.
To make our 6:30pm anniversary reservation in Yountville, we left at 6:05pm, just as the party was wrapping up and the music ended. Our relaxing afternoon away from kids ended with frustration at the volume, disappointment that our attempts to ask for help went unanswered and not a wink of sleep.
This hotel is nice, the staff we interacted with are personal and the location is ideal for a relaxing anniversary stay.
And we understand hotels host events that make noise. But this wasn't in a ballroom or a meeting room. This was vacuum cleaner level volume right outside our window.
We would've been disappointed with 5 hours of that noise 20 feet from our pillow and a lack of response at any of the many Hyatt Houses and Hyatt Places we've visited across the country. We expected another level of service and relaxation when we made our first ever reservation at an Andaz hotel.
Instead, we left with our Hyatt account drained, our desire for a relaxing anniversary stay unmet and our disappointment high that, in our attempt to connect with the hotel through a means that we know works, went ignored.
As a follow up, I sent this note to the hotel's general manager after check out. To her credit, she replied within an hour, apologizing for the deafening noise and the lack of a response. She also credited me half of my points back to apologize.
Overall, a nice hotel in a convenient location with an appropriate Hyatt category rating. The employees were all pleasant, the room was clean and the bed was comfortable. If it wasn't for the deafening noise for five hours and the lack of responsiveness, I would've given it a 5 out of 5.
