For a bit of business to be handled I found myself in the capital city of the Republic of South Africa, Pretoria, staying a full week at the three-star hotel, The Manhattan. Of course being in the travel marketing industry means that business is always but always mixed in with pleasure, sometimes to the point that you wouldn’t be able to distinguish which is which.

So to get right into it with the review of the Manhattan, its name suggests that it’s an American style hotel, which it is, whatever that means. It seemed like any other three-star rated hotel to me except they do use American English spelling on all their documentation and signage.

There’s what appears to be a 24-hour doorman/concierge manning the front door and I got to know a couple of them a little more personally since I was around for a week.

The reception area is very clean and has just the right selection of decorations to render it a classy-looking joint. They managed to get it just right and not spill over into any form of tackiness.

I was booked into one of the bigger rooms it seems as there was what I can only refer to as a king-and-a-half sized bed for me to sleep in all alone which faced a flat screen TV mounted on the wall with access to satellite channels. Below the TV is a nice sized desk with different plug sockets, one of which matched my electronics so I had no problems with any connectivity.

The free Wi-Fi was good enough, but again I had it on good authority that I got a bit lucky with my room because in some of the other rooms the guests complained about the Wi-Fi being slow and constantly disconnecting.

The in-house restaurant on the second floor serves some good food, but it feels a bit like one is a school kid having to queue if you’ve pre-booked a meal, something which is advised since walking into the restaurant spontaneously and ordering meals on the spot is a lot more expensive than if you pre-book your meals.

There’s a laundry service at an extra cost and you can also order a variety of massages to be enjoyed up in your room or you can go down to the in-house spa area for your massage.

The walls are a bit thin though because you can sort of hear the conversations of some guests who are occupying the rooms next to yours, but you’d have to listen very hard to really hear what they’re saying.

All in all I’d say that this could very well pass for a four or even five star hotel, but I’m just not too keen on the daily room service knocks you get which tend to come a bit too early in the morning for me.

Location wise the hotel is close to everything, literally and since Pretoria is indeed a capital city, there’s lots of entertainment to be enjoyed in and around the city.