Halliburton often uses the Ramada Plaza Denver North to house trainees coming in from as far away as Farmington, NM, and Williston, ND. It’s a rather nice hotel at a reasonable rate.

I got a king non-smoking room, which is always nice. The high bed had a nice and comfortable pillow-top mattress, but the fitted sheet kept coming off the bed with any sort of pull. My room was very cramped with barely enough room to walk around and no room to exercise. At the desk, the six-way outlet had one outlet free for a laptop.

The room came with a microwave and a refrigerator stocked with Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, a small bottle of wine, Coors and Coors Light (Colorado, duh), and two bottled waters. On top of the refrigerator was a basket of trail mix, crackers, cookies, and other dry goods. All of this came with no additional charge.

The hotel has a Damon’s for the restaurant. Service was good at the restaurant, and the onion loaf and steamboat came that came via room service stayed warm. Breakfast was handled by the hotel itself, which gave us a coupon for a free breakfast (no gratuity) that had a decent breakfast buffet and the occasional omelette chef.

TV service was about 50 channels, lacking HBO/SHO/etc but having Disney, SciFi, Food, ESPN/2/News/Classic and some of the other premium channels. Internet access was available with both wire and wireless. My wireless worked, but my fellow trainer had trouble. In the middle of the floor, he had five access points available, and I couldn’t get the laptop to pick one AP and stay with it. His ethernet service was fine.

Heat was provided by a wall unit away from the window with an electronic thermostat. It performed quite well. The bathroom made good use of cramped quarters, but the outwardly bowed shower curtain hits the occupant while sitting on the toilet. Water pressure was good and strong, and the hot water was quickly available. There was a large but tight crack in one of the shower walls.

I was too sick and inundated with work this week to work out in the fitness room, but I saw a StairMaster and a treadmill in a rather large room.

A lot of highway construction forces guests to drive a tortuous path to the hotel. It should be better by this fall. One of the other trainers complained of road noise from Highway 25, but I didn’t mind it as much.

Among all the hotels in the Ramada chain, this was among the best that I’ve been too. Ramada is not a brand that I associate with consistency. This hotel, formerly a Holiday Inn. is quite good, and a corporate rate around $80 isn’t bad. Ramada stays earn TripRewards points, which are useful if you know your needs about a month in advance.


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