The Grand Hotel in Salem

Of the half dozen or so places I've stayed in Salem, the Grand stands head and shoulders above the rest. Spacious, well appointed rooms with all the amenities. Good bar and restaurant and friendly staff. Have already scheduled a return. Pretty good value.

Nice downtown location, but it's only five stories high so if you get a nice room you listen to traffic all night. The hotel is sandwiched between the two main north south arterials. If you insist on a non roadside room you listen to the heating system all night in the "courtyard." I had to ask three times for a decent room and even agreed to pay whatever upcharges they wanted. We still ended up listening to the heating system which was ok with earplugs except on the second night a bearing went out or something and made sleep impossible. I have seldom run into a more unfriendly, vindictive even, staff. Although in fairness they did make the people upstairs stop their children's marathon training at close to midnight. One of the elevators was broken and never fixed the entire weekend. I just cannot say enough bad things about the worthless staff in this hotel. I travel 150 nights a year sometimes and have seldom run into such bad service.

The hotel is clean, even a little posh and upscale, though with a down to earth staff, quite friendly. The most pleasing surprise was our room, called a king suite, which we chose over the double queen room for only ten dollars more. It was like a small apartment with a living area, couch, chair, and second TV. Very roomy and it was nice and cool on arrival, which was a rather warm day. We stayed one day to attend a nearby wedding and found the area to have plenty of shopping, the little interesting shops along with a big mall only blocks away, and plenty of restaurants, bar and grills, along with small eateries to choose from. The morning after we tried the provided continental breakfast, wow! Scrambled eggs, sausage and waffles, not some cheap tray of donuts. One other thing that is important to me and my wife -- the bed had four good pillows, not just two. And they were cushy plush pillows. We slept well. All the above and the price was even decent. My wife and I enjoyed this hotel and definitely recommend it to others.

Until this hotel came along, there was simply no good hotel in Salem. The breakfast is a great value.

Our room was very nice. This is a newer hotel so everything was very nice. Our room was spacious and quiet even though it was on a busy section of town. Everything was just very comfortable.