Australia Sydney Four Points Sheraton Darling Hrb

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Four Points Sheraton Sydney Darling Harbour Hotel Review

Period Visited: June 2004

Nights Stayed: 2

This hotel advertised itself as the largest hotel in Australia. It has over 600 rooms. This hotel used to be a Nikko hotel and is still frequented by Japanese tourists. The location is probably the best thing about this hotel. Although it is branded as a Four Points but this hotel certainly is trying to appear as a Sheraton. The atmosphere and room decor are more like a Westin category than a Four Points. My experience of the services level varied widely. The hotel treatment for SPG gold member is below average for no harbour view room upgrade.

Fitness Center: This hotel has a medium sized fitness room on the second floor with about a dozen exercise machines. There is no swimming pool nor whirlpool/sauna facility.

Shopping: The Harbour shopping center is about 10 minutes walking. You can also walk to the City Center (about 15 minutes walk). There used to be a Takashimaya department store next door but it is closed for business.

Transportation: The Harbour Ferry is only about 7 minutes walk.

Hotel Limo transfer to Airport for A$40. 5 minutes walk to the mono rail train that can take you to the powerhouse museum and Chinatown.

Attractions: Make sure you visit the Aquarium (one of the few attractions in Sydney that open late until 9:00PM). There are some pretty large sharks, stingrays in the oceanarium worth seeing.

Restaurant: Corn Exchange Restaurant

Breakfast Buffet(A$29.95): Japanese (Miso, rice), Bread and Pastry. Salad and Yogurt, hot Plates (Ham, Sausage, Hush Brown, scrambled eggs, etc...).

Lunch Buffet: A$50

Dinner Seafood buffet: (Sun-Fri:A$50, Sat:A$60). Limited hot food selection. Cold plate seafood includes: Large Shrimp, Rock Oyster, Balmar bugs, Crabs. salad bar, cheese bar, dessert bar, tea or coffee or flappoccino(very good). Although this restaurant seems to have won some awards but I was not impressed with the food selection. We had good service at dinner time.

- If you have the Starwood Privilege Card then you can use it here. Actually, they have flyers advertising this card for A$245. The Starwood Privilege Card can provide food discount.

- Perhaps because of the colder weather, with the plastic screens outside of the restaurant balcony, the harbor view is obscured. For better view or atmosphere, you might want to consider one of many restaurants next to the harbor.

My Ratings:

Location: 5/5. Excellent location. Adjacent to Sydney Aquarium (5 minutes walk) and Darling Harbor King Warf. Good view of Darling Harbor's Maritime museum and Sydney convention center.

Room: 4/5. The renovated city view room is clean and quiet. Room size is relatively small. Coffee maker and iron/ironing board. There is a voltage adapter in the room for 115V US appliances. TV channels are very limited to about a dozen or so (CNN, ESPN, no movies channels such as HBO, STAR, etc). Upgraded harbor view room is very nice. It has sofa, small refrigerator, microwave, toaster. Larger bath room (no separate shower). Dressing room.

Service: 3/5. I had a very varied service level experience.

Value: 3.5/5. Excellent Starwood category 2 cash and points redemption. Inconsistent service level and few amenities reduced the overall value. The website price for a city view room is about A$235 and harbor view is A$295. The Harbor view studio is A$490 (worthy upgrade for 1500 star points)