Review: Holiday Inn Krakow City Centre, Poland

IHG has two hotels in Krakow, Poland with Holiday Inn Krakow City Centre and Hotel Indigo Krakow Old Town. Both hotels are great locations for Krakow tourists with easy access to Old Town/Stare Miasto. Holiday Inn Krakow has more direct access to Old Town Square with only a 200 meter walk across the street into Planty, the nearly encircling green belt of trees and grass surrounding the dozens of residential, businesses and educational blocks of buildings creating Old Town Krakow. Planty is the space where medieval city walls and bastions stood for centuries until they were dismantled in the early 19th century. Most of the brick work of the old city walls has been replaced by greenery, park benches and plaques throughout the Planty showing historic fortifications.Â

a tall rectangular structure with a stained glass window — Krakow Planty Old Town green belt showing one of the 2022 centennial for a Krkaow stained glass factory in city art exhibit.

Hotel Indigo Krakow Old Town is where we spent six nights. Hotel Indigo has an excellent location one block north of the Old Town Barbican and adjacent to Stary Kleparz outdoor covered market place. Krakow train station is 5 minutes walk from the hotel, accessed from inside Galeria Krakowska shopping mall. KRK airport train is inexpensive at 5.50 PLN/$1.20 to Gdansk Glowny. Carrefour Market on the top floor of the mall is a major grocery store option for a wide selection when the numerous corner markets of Zabka and Carrefour Express or the street market of Stary Kleparz don’t have all the food items you want.

a building with glass windows — Galeria Krakowska with Krakow train station.

The primary reason for describing the benefits of Hotel Indigo Krakow is due to the fact that our ten nights spent in these two IHG Krakow hotels surprised me in that we enjoyed our four nights at Holiday Inn Krakow as the better hotel stay.Â

Two aspects of Holiday Inn Krakow were better than Hotel Indigo Krakow.

Holiday Inn Krakow Premium Room 127 was significantly larger than the triple upgrade corner room at Hotel Indigo Krakow I was upgraded to as IHG Diamond member.

Breakfast at Holiday Inn Krakow offered a wide selection of food with a large active staff catering to the needs of a room often filled with 40 to 75 breakfast guests. Hotel Indigo Krakow generally had only three to six other diners when we ate our breakfast during the last hour of service. It seemed that if any of the food items ran out during the morning they were not replaced at Hotel Indigo. There was generally limited bread choices by the time we arrived for breakfast. Holiday Inn Krakow ran full service all the way to the end of breakfast hours.

a building with cars parked in front of it — Holiday Inn Krakow City Centre exterior front entrance.

I have stayed at Holiday Inn Krakow several times since 2016. It seems I am located in a different part of the hotel each time. This was my first time staying in a room above the conference wing section on Floor 1 room 127. There was a separate elevator awayÂ from the main lobby elevators that was rarely used and we could walk from the hotel entrance to the conference wing for a kind of private elevator that placed us only a a couple doors away to our room.

a building with many windows and cars parked on the side of it — Holiday Inn Krakow Room 127 is room left of balcony railing on right side of photo. Doors to the street are accessible to exit hotel, although main entrance is only way into hotel.

a sign on a door — Holiday Inn Krakow Premium Room 127

a room with a desk and chairs — Holiday Inn Krakow 127 chairs and table with floor to ceiling drapes.

a room with a desk and a chair — Holiday Inn Krakow 127 TV-desk.

Room 127 had a coffee maker and refrigerator in cabinet beneath stocked with drinks. A tray of fruit with a box of peanuts was on the table as a welcome gift.

a plate of fruit and juice on a table — Holiday Inn Krakow welcome amenity included fruit, a box of peanuts and bottle of Soplica Wisniowa Cherry Vodka. Kelley said it was much stronger than the end-of-meal cherry vodka shots at Sukiennice.

a coffee machine and coffee cups on a table — Holiday Inn Krakow 127 coffee, tea and water.

a mirror on the wall — Holiday Inn Krakow 127 room closet, mirror and photo art depicting Krakow Planty green space.

a bed with a chandelier and a red wall — Holiday Inn Krakow 127 king bed and chandelier.

Holiday Inn Krakow Room 127 bathroom

After six days using the tiny Hotel Indigo Krakow bathroom, the bathroom at Holiday Inn Krakow seemed luxurious.

a bathroom with a bathtub and toilet — Holiday Inn Krakow room 127 bathroom with tub and heat rack useful for drying hand laundry.

a bathroom with a mirror and sinks — Holiday Inn Krakow bathroom sink.

a group of soap bottles on a shelf — Holiday Inn Krakow bathroom toiletries were same as Hotel Indigo Krakow.

a window with a white frame — Holiday Inn Krakow windows opened for cool air.

Holiday Inn Krakow room 127 was a functional space for watching FIFA World Cup 2022 games with chairs and a table for eating $10 pizza purchased across the street at Szamot na Wielopolu, a pizza restaurant at Hotel Wielopolu.Â

Holiday Inn Krakow Hotel Lobby

The lobby was almost always occupied with seated people during our stay. There was an NGO conference for a couple days and then a two bus load group of Jewish tourists with their daily itinerary posted on easels near the front entrance to the hotel. I had no photos of the entrance lobby area with colorful cushion chairs since it was always occupied. Below is the lobby photo from the IHG hotel website. Off the main entrance lobby were a couple of other room spaces for guests seen in my photos below.

a room with chairs and tables — IHG website photo: Holiday Inn Krakow front entrance lobby.

My photos below show the room with wall paper bookshelves seen in the background of the IHG hotel lobby photo above. The doors in the background of the IHG lobby photo lead to the conference room wing of the hotel where we would walk for the elevator up to our room 127.

a room with a table and chairs — Holiday Inn Krakow lobby space side room.

a desk with a computer and a printer on it — Holiday Inn Krakow lobby guest computer.

a room with a couch and table — Holiday Inn Krakow kids play room.

Holiday Inn Krakow Breakfast Room

Breakfast at Holiday Inn Krakow was served 6:30-10:30 each day in The City, a -1 floor large room with a wrap-around buffet counter.

a door with a chandelier from it — Holiday Inn Krakow dining room

We generally ate during the last 30 to 40 minutes of service. The buffet at Holiday Inn Krakow had a great selection of breads, bagels, fruit, salad items, various cold fish, hot eggs, beans, bacon and sausages, pancakes, yogurt, sliced cheeses and meats and more. Omelettes and fried eggs could be ordered.

Diamond elite complimentary breakfast was 160 PLN /$35.55 USD added value daily for the two of us during our 4-night stay.Â