Reval Latvija Hotel Riga

My boyfriend and I stayed in the Reval Hotel Latvija at the end of February 2008. The location of the hotel couldn't have been better,just at the edge of the Old Town and on the corner of Elizabetes iela and Brivibas iela. Our room had a lovely view of the Russian Orthodox cathedral and Esplanade Park. You can pay extra for a room with an old town view but we didn't but still had a lovely view from our 5th floor room. The buffet breakfast was excellent, a huge choice of hot and cold food to suit local and other tastes. The room was perfect and should suit any travellers needs perfectly, it was very clean and comfortable with a good sized and equipped bathroom. The 26th floor Skyline bar was a great place to drink cocktails and look at a great view of Riga, the Lobby bar and Casino were also nice. I didn't visit the Voodoo nightclub but it looked pretty popular on Friday and Saturday. Unfortunately I have one very big complaint about this hotel that would turn me off ever staying there again and thats the staff. Its such a shame because everything else about this hotel is great and 5 star quality but the staff are so rude, unfriendly and bad at their jobs that it brings the hotel right down. Both my boyfriend and I made an effort with the Latvian language, we were nice and grateful to staff at all times but they could not have been more rude, the list of issues that I have is endless and some that I should take up with the hotel directly such as items been taken from our minibar (presumably by the chambermaid), being told we were late for breakfast when it was 35mins before it finished, being refused an itemised bill for our extra expenses. The list of issues is endless and I won't continue to moan on about them here. At times it seemed that they were going out of their way to be unwelcoming The bottom line is - stay here if you want a good location, comfortable room and nice breakfast but dont expect good service from any of the staff including the staff at the Skyline bar. We enjoyed our stay in Riga but that was because we were determined to have a good time and would not let some rude unwelcoming people put us off our holiday. I'm giving an overall rating of "below average", were it not for the staff I would be giving a rating of "superb".