Larvik Museum

We stayed at the hotel in early September experiencing excellent service. Receptionist Lilian allowed us to park our car there before the check-in time so that we could spend most of the day exploring Oslo. She was so patient and showed us the best ways to get to a few places in the city. Other staff were also very helpful. Clean everywhere, including large and shared kitchen and bath rooms. Breakfast was excellent. The hotel is next to a large playground in a very quiet residential area. Will stay there when coming to Oslo in the future.

It’s great! However, you have to remember many rules while there. I noticed a little double standard when it comes to phone usage. We spent a full week at the property and we felt policed about phone usage 24/7, when to use the swimsuit, when not to use the swimsuit, when to use the towel, when not to use the towels, which stairs I am allowed to use and which I am not allowed to use. The spa police will get into the steam room and sauna and make you get naked if you are wearing the swimsuit. The excuse was that wearing the swimsuit will place the chlorine on the wood as well as the sweat and that’s why you must lay the towel down and then be naked on top of the towel. However, magically on Tuesdays that’s not a problem at all. You can wear the swimsuit in the sauna and spa no problem as long as the towel is under you. We were stopped by multiple people multiple times just for the simple act of looking at our phone to see what time it is. There aren’t many clocks around the spa, therefore, we had to see the time on our phones to not loose track of time. Furthermore, at breakfast there were 4 people using their phones making calls, sending texts and browsing through their phones and not one word was said to them. I recommend the spa for one day only as I had used it in the past, but for a full week I don’t think this is the place you want to be specially when you don’t want to be bossed around of what you can or can not do as as small child. All else was great, good food!

A fire breaking out in the middle of the night is never good news. However, worse was the fact the emergency exit was padlocked! The single staff member was clearly overwhelmed and never offered any explanation or communication while we were evacuated into the street or thereafter while we waited to get back into our rooms after the fire brigades had left. Aside from the fire incident, the hotel could do with better housekeeping (emptying the bin and replacing a towel is not quite good enough) . The mattresses seem to be as old as the hotel, ie 126 years.