Petit Hôtel Café Krieghoff

I used to live in QC and am a native French speaker - this was no misunderstanding. I feel like a fool for not researching this place better and believing the top reviews. I care for an elderly parent and now live across the country. I booked this Cafe Auberge on this visit because I wanted the boutique/neighbourhood feel and have a mini vacation. Did not happen. The good: You would be on a cool street with lots of arts, cafe, restaurants… walking distance to Grande Allée (2 min) and the old town (15-20 minute walk). Food is ok and most of the staff was quite pleasant.

The bad: the noise & customer service. I had the room above the cafe. As soon as the staff entered at 6AM, don’t even think about sleeping. They are cleaning and setting up, moving chairs/tables around enough to vibrate your mattress and pillow on top of the noise. Since it is a busy street and the restaurant is opened at night, you won’t go to bed super early either. I slept 7 hours total in 2 nights. As I was trying to checkout early, being RIGHT was very important to the manager. She invented an “altercation” (her word) where there as none, in an effort to make me feel like I was stupid and difficult. I did say she needed to work on her customer service skills. I worked in the hospitality industry for 10 years, I have never spoken to anyone like I was spoken to here. I was just exhausted and expressing myself and all of a sudden, she started to tell me off and stared me down with all the self righteousness and superiority she could muster. The ugly: Now, since the whole staff kept repeating they never had a noise complaint before like drones, I smelled a rat and went on google reviews, tripadvisor, and booking.com and filtering on the negative reviews, I found numerous reviews of people who complained of very bad noises from all rooms for different reasons and all were told the same thing I was: never had a complaint before. Very similar experience in both French and English. So lying to you, making you feel small and stupid seem to be the norm here. There is no parking here. Your options are: hope for a spot on a tight side streets where you will have 90 minutes free parking between 9 and 5 on weekdays. This is a busy area and I had to circle around a while and walk with my luggage and keep time to make sure I didn't stay over 90 minutes in the same spot. You can ask the Shell station nearby who will let you park there for $10 or find a regular pay parking lot (not sure about in and out privileges). There are a few metered street parking.