Festningen Hotel & Resort

The hotel is part of Kongsvinger Castle. Really excellent rooms, large and spacious but with lighting fixtures that were so sophisticated that we must have help turning on and off the lighting in the room! The three-course dinner that the hotel offered was tasty, but the strange thing was that they did not have any printed menus. The person who took the order did not know for sure what was included in the menu! She worked as a waitress in the evening and cleaned hotel rooms in the morning and put all the laundry in the elevator so it could not be used for the guests. The big disadvantage was that the hotel is located at such a height that you have to lug all your luggage up a steep uphill slope for maybe 100 meters. A car could be driven up in an emergency, but in that case you were forced to drive through two gates where one was so narrow that there was a risk of damaging the car. The location in the city meant that you had a wonderful view but at the same time it was not walkable. At the same time, the walk to the hotel was strenuous and the air conditioning that had been needed in the room, and which was also promised when booking on hotels.com, was not available! The bathroom had frosted glass walls, which meant that the whole room was lit up at night during bathroom visits, which made it difficult for the other person to sleep. The breakfast was served on the table and consisted of fruit, vegetables and salami etc. For the vegetarian, there was no alternative. To recommend? Yes, for those who find it easy to walk up steep slopes (even with luggage) and who find it easy to sleep even though the whole room was lit up during a night visit to the bathroom.

Are you interested in old history? Want to stay at a historic place, have a nice breakfast from tables covered with white cloths made of real fabric, and served by friendly and serviceminded staff? And no traffic noice at all? This is the place! Despite small rooms (you can always upgrade), and easy to listen in to what is going on in the next room, and the fact that you have to walk some hundred meters from the (free) parking lot nearby, I highly recommend this hotel. (Funny that my GPS-device showed me a route to another hotel in town when Festningen was asked for, so stay alert:)) It could even be better to stay there in summertime, albeit tpetrhaps more noisy.

The hotel has a very nice location within the fortress. The rooms are located in an old, but nicely renovated building, The room was clean and nice, but nothing special. The breakfast is served in anorther builing across the courtyard, the breakfast was good, but the buffet is not very big. Quite expensive.

Tar det beste først. Senga var god. Vi hadde gledet oss til å overnatte på dette hotellet i historiske omgivelser. Vi sjekket at hotellet hadde restaurant. På telefon samme dag som ankomst fikk vi informasjon at vi kunne få middag om vi ankom Festningen hotel&resort før 21:00. Dette stemte ikke. Flyet til Gardermoen var 2 timer forsinket, men vi ankom hotellet 20:40. Vi ble henvist til å kjøpe pizza fra byen da de ikke hadde varm mat til oss. Skuffelsen var stor da vi hadde stolt på den informasjonen vi hadde fått. Rommet, Suiten: vi måtte ned på kne under pulten for å komme til stikkontakten, suiten var spartansk og kjedelig, belysningen var svært dårlig, prisen sto ikke i forhold til rommet. Såper og shampo på bad sto høyt på veggen og gjør det vanskelig for hender med artritt. Jeg spurte derfor om de hadde en løs såpeflaske jeg kunne bruke, men det fikk jeg ikke. Ved frokosten la jeg merke til at andre gjester forsynte seg med hendene da det ikke var lagt fram bestikk og skjeer til dette. Fingre på pålegg og i agurk og paprikaskåler med mere framsto uappetittlig. Det blir nok med dette ene besøket på dette hotellet og skuffelsen er stor. Det må mere til enn historiske omgivelser. Tenker på hvor store muligheter som finnes på dette stedet om spesielt service og rom hadde vært bedre. Jeg er trist.

Meget flott og historisk beliggenhet. Et festningsverk mot svenske angrep på 1800 tallet. Festningen virker ikke! Vi var to av få norske; resten svenske turister! Maten, tre-retters var av svært høy standard. Hotell rommet var i det minste ****.