Hotels in Zhez

First, some general comments. All the hotels were clean, had laundry ‘service’ available, and a restaurant on premise; if we asked, each one did have an English menu. We had to pay cash – they did not accept credit cards (we were told that the Baykonur did, though ONLY Visa). None of the hotels had cribs. Where we could, we got a larger room/two beds or double bed. Windows in the rooms rarely seemed to have screens on them.

There were no elevators that we could find (so keep that in mind when you pack!) Heard later from someone else that traveled there was an elevator at the Samsung.

We started out at the Samsung, and were there for about 3 ½ weeks. Eventually we did want to be a bit closer into town, and we knew once we got custody of the kids there was not going to be enough room in this one room at the Samsung for the 4 of us. Price was right though, and people were nice.

In retrospect, would have to say the Business Center was probably the best for our money and fit our needs (ok I’m sure the Baykonur would have been great, but not in our budget). Location was good as we walked a lot; at the Samsung we’d walk but it was a longer trip in, so it was only once in and back each day. There was a delegation that came in to town from Almaty so we ended up getting moved from Business Center (they sent us over to the Metallurg), but to the best of our knowledge they did not have any cribs. The space in the room was what would have made this place workable with the two kids.

In general our sense is that it is easy to get into the Samsung (they have quite a few rooms); the other hotels in town are booked a lot, though in all honestly we do not know if this is in part because of the availability of double/larger rooms or not. Through our translator, we just kept calling every few days to see if something would be opening up.

Hotel 'Samsung'
Rate: 3000 KZT (tenge) / night, double; from another traveler later this year the rate for a single was 2500 KZT per night
Room: all rooms appear to be the same size, but different furniture based on single or double; not many doubles.
Location: outside of town, can take taxi, or for us it was about a 25 min walk to town.
TV: all foreign language
Phone: long distance calls needed to be set up by the front desk; local calls not a problem; people can call you
Bathroom: reasonable size, counter space; tub w/ shower. Decent shower/water pressure
Notes: We're guessing this hotel was built in the ‘80s, by Samsung, rooms w/ private bath. Some rooms w/ double beds. Private bath, small fridge. Clean, simply appointed starting to show its age. Ample storage for our clothes (two adults) . Rooms are small – 2 people max semi-comfortably. We would have liked a small table or desk (single has one), a lamp or two as we had trouble finding a place to read in the room other than on the bed. We did not find the bed comfortable, trouble sleeping for more than a few hours at a time; since there were two of those very nice/heavy blankets, we tried putting one of those under the bottom sheet and it helped significantly. Shower is nice, plenty of hot water. Towels and other linens were changed out every 3 days. In the bath, provided shampoo and soap; no hair dryer. There is a TV, but no English channels.

From what we could see the single rooms had a desk, though we did not see any lamps (may have to get one at the market).

The staff is very nice. As one would expect, you won’t find many that speak English. We were able to get some laundry done for us. Restaurant in hotel; limited menu, serve breakfast lunch & dinner. They do have a copy of the menu translated into English.

Unable to dial out from the room, other than local calls. We were told we could ‘schedule’ making a long distance call, and family could call in to us.


Hotel 'Business Center'
[For us, in retrospect, we think this was the best place to stay – location, cost, and BBC.]
Rate: ~ 8400 KZT / night – larger room
Room: Spacious, side-by-side single beds (movable, put together to make double). Nightstands w/ table lamps. Floor lamp and a couple of reading chairs, also a desk w/ TV.
Phone:
TV: BBC (English) and other foreign language channels
A/C: yes; did have some issues with it, but they did fix them within a day or so each time
Bathroom: spacious
Restaurant/Bar: adjoining; decent/reasonable hours.
Decent food; though not on the menu, we were able to get toast in the morning; we had more options at this hotel for breakfast, things like toast, yogurt, coffee, perhaps pancakes (like crepes, in many ways)

Notes: We were able to put the two single beds together; room had nightstands and lights, comfortable place to read, enough space (we did have a larger room) for both of us to be comfortable hanging out there. We did have some noise issues with neighboring rooms when the hotel was full up, but given that we were expecting to be here with 2 kids for a few days, we did not complain.

This hotel is located near the lake/reservoir, and on the edge of town. Reasonable walk to a grocery/market, the internet cafe.

Hotel 'Metallurg'
Rate: similar to Business Center, ~ 8000/night, double (we got a better rate because the B.C. moved us here for the last few days of our stay)
Room: see notes
Phone: yes; we just used for local calls, not sure how calling out long distance would work
TV: nothing in English
Bathroom: small; shower stall only, no tub. Small sink, no counterspace to speak of.
Notes: Room here is probably about the same size as the one at the Samsung, though there is more floor space here as the furniture is less. Rob & Laura Petry style sleeping arrangements – the bed frames are bolted to the wall so not much chance of changing that. Bathroom is quite tight; standing shower only, no counter space; a challenge to find a place to hang anything to dry. Decent size fridge. Staff were nice enough. There is a restaurant – food similar to that of the Business Center, menu looks very much the same. There appears to be a bar, but we never checked it out as we had the kids by this point. There were two chairs in the room, though they were more of the ‘desk chair’ type, so not “comfy” for curling up with a book type thing.

Not a place we’d really choose to stay for any real length of time for the two of us, but a few days is fine. We’d really prefer the ability to at least put the beds together; perhaps that was an option in a different room, but not the one we had.

That said, the location of this one is terrific. Right in town. Right off the start of what one might call the ‘promonade’ walk (nice wide tree lined walkway, cars on either side). Mini-market is very close by, as are restaurants. (Not too far from internet café either.)


Hotel 'Baykonur'
Rate: more than any of the others (recollection is that for a large room it was running about 12000 KZT for single, 15000 for large/double. ) It’s located right on the reservoir/lake, so the setting is quite lovely. The facility does hold parties, weddings, and this is where the president stays when he comes into town. It is quite beautiful. They have a gazebo on the waters edge - nice setting for a photo.

We did not stay here; ate at the restaurant once, which was very nice (good), did always intend to go back but ran out of time. The room we saw was beautiful, comparable to a very nice hotel here in the states. They said as long as you had a laptop, one could get internet access from the room.