River in Sight

I couldn’t find a thread for this hotel and wanted to document my recent one-week stay here for anyone who may be considering it.

Booking: I paid 8K points/nt (Cat 2) for a week, which worked for me vs around €160. I then applied a TSU to the Executive Suite for a week with no trouble.

Many of the staff speak English, but not all. The front desk staff all speak English and they can help navigate any questions you may have.. they gave us a comprehensive run-down of the amenities when we arrived.

At check-out we were charged around €38/nt which I assume is part of Hyatt’s reimbursement to the hotel. The front desk agent and I could not communicate effectively on the charge so I paid it and am awaiting my concierge to sort it out. On the plus side, I earned points on the amount in addition to the 500 pts/nt new hotel bonus so I ended up getting over 5K points back.

Room: The pictures on Hyatt.com are out of date and pre-renovation, the rooms look much fresher in real life. Note: although the Exec Suite has pocket doors between the living room and bedroom in the Hyatt.com picture, these doors were no longer present in my renovated suite and there was no option for privacy in the bedroom.

• Our suite overlooked the restaurant but we heard no noise at all, things quiet down pretty early and it was a quiet crowd.
• Other than very slight background noise from the restaurant patio during the day, we heard no disruptive noise from inside or out.
• The room does not have A/C and even though the weather was only in the 60s-70s during our stay, the room did get warm. The front desk provided us with a fan. I’m not sure how often it gets into the 80s or higher but when it does the room must be quite stuffy.
• We received a small welcome gift of jam, chutney, and two bottles of sparkling water. The water was replaced daily.
• The room has a nespresso machine and there is milk in the fridge for coffee

Overall we really enjoyed the suite, which has 1.5 baths and a huge terrace (double width with a table, two chairs, and lounger) looking out over the harbor. The bed was comfortable and everything was functional. I just wish it had a door between the living room and bedroom.

Things to do

• Tennis: There’s one court and rackets are available for €5 (once we were charged, once we weren’t); balls are provided with the rackets. I never saw anyone else on the court.
• Mini-Golf: Also €5, but it was concrete and we didn’t do it. There is a much nicer mini-golf in town at Camp David
• Pool:
  • There is a small indoor pool (10 meters) in the hotel, but it’s only available for children a few hours per day (4-530PM and 90 mins at midday), the rest of the time is adults only
  • There is another indoor pool around a 5 minute walk away in the “AquaFun” complex that’s more family oriented, but it was never overrun.
    • Note: You must enter 1 hour before the closing time (I am not sure of the purpose of this rule but I was rejected twice before I figured it out - in other words if the pool closes at 6PM, you need to enter by 5PM).
  • AquaFun also has an outdoor pool, but it was way too cold for me
• Playgrounds: 2 pretty nice playgrounds on the property for the kids
• Beach: There is a small beach at the property but I recommend going to the main beach which is much larger (see below)
• Bike Rentals: There is a bike rental hut on the property with very reasonable prices (compared to the US at least). My son and I rented 8-speed bikes for 2 hours each and the grand total was €13.. this was plenty of time to ride to the scenic lookout (Großklützhöved) and back, about 10 miles r/t.

Breakfast

• Very carb heavy with a wide variety of bread, donuts, etc. I didn’t have the sweets but the bread was good.
• Eggs are available cooked to order and they were good, just flag someone down and they’ll get them for you.
• Aside from carbs and eggs there were meats and cheeses, veggies, cut fruit, smoked fish, and scrambled eggs and accompaniments.
• The breakfast was solid but nothing extraordinary.

Dining: We never had dinner on the property but if you walk to the BEECH Resort Lobby, there is a cafe on the harbor side that has pizzas and pastas at a reasonable price. Additionally, if you walk over toward the harbor (Hafen) there are a couple of fish shops. There is also a Netto grocery store around a 10 minute walk away.

Laundry: If you go into the BEECH Resort Lobby (linked above) and take the glass door on the wall left of the front desk, you’ll enter a hallway; turn left, continue down the hallway and you’ll come to a laundry room. 2 washers and 2 dryers are available for €3. This saved us as we’re on a long trip and couldn’t find anywhere else to do laundry in this area. Note: The dryer takes a long time and is not very effective.

Boltenhagen: I knew absolutely nothing about Boltenhagen before visiting. My family decided to spend a month in Germany and we were looking for places to go, Boltenhagen was somewhat along the way of our other stops. It reminded me of Cape Cod. The hotel is a bit removed from the downtown but it’s doable.

• We didn’t have a car, there are bus options or it’s a pleasant walk to the town
• If you go the most direct way (leave straight out of the lobby, turn left on Mecklenburger Allee, then turn onto the nature trail you’ll see on your right) you can be to the main beach in around .9 miles
• It’s around 2.5 miles total from the hotel to downtown Boltenhagen and there is a path and/or boardwalk the entire way. There is a nude beach around halfway to town.
• You need a pass for the beach and the hotel will give it to you at check-in. Make sure you carry it as we were asked for ours a couple of times
• The beach is pleasant but the water was only 64 when we were there which is way below my comfort level!
• Ostseehappen Boltenhagen: We had lunch here twice, it’s a little stand just outside of the downtown with EXCELLENT sausages (you will typically see a line down the sidewalk), I recommend it for a casual bite to eat and they also have beer.

Wismar is also a nice option for a day trip, a pretty little town around an hour bus ride away.

I would definitely return if I happened to be in the area again. Pictures below and I would be glad to answer any Qs.


Welcome gift (sparkling water was replenished daily)


Living room with fold-out couch. The door in both this room and the bedroom open and have screens.


Bedroom; there was TONS of storage space with a closet area to the right of this picture, and another in the living room


Terrace overlooking the harbor


Playground #1 on property


Playground #2 on property


Laundry room in the BEECH Resorts building (credit card is accepted)


Breakfast varieties


Beach

jpdx

We stayed here a couple weeks ago, and I wrote a review in the main Lindner hotels thread. Assumed this place was obscure enough not to warrant its own thread, but since you started one, let me paste my review here.

The property opened as an Iberostar in 2008, was shut down for a refurb in 2023, and reflagged to Lindner in Spring 2024. It is by far the least run-down Lindner I've been to.

Located in the quaint Baltic sea resort town of Boltenhagen, all rooms overlooking a small harbor and bay. Fairly scenic, but not a standout in terms of views. The area may get very crowded when the nearby timeshares/lower budget apartments are full. There's a small beach in walking distance of the hotel, but rocky and dirty and absolutely nothing to write home about. A better beach is in the nearby town of Boltenhagen -- several kilometers long, typical low-key Baltic sea atmosphere with elderly Germans when we were there just before the beginning of German summer vacation season (mid June). Likely busy with families during peak season. Note that all beaches in the region require a tag for access -- the hotel will provide this for the Boltenhagen area (front desk explained what it is and advised carrying it), but if you drive around, you will have to buy tags from parking-machine looking contraptions everywhere you go (often costing €3 or so per person). Not a big deal, but we were warned at the nearby island of Poel that you need to pay for both, parking and a beach tag.

I'd booked two rooms on points (Cat 2) when availability opened up, but soon canceled those reservation and booked a €104/nt Grand Opening Rate instead. Applied a suite upgrade to one room and were given an Executive suite and the adjacent Deluxe room. The suites are large and modern, although with cheap furniture and a somewhat lackluster design. Nice balcony with a sun lounger and small table with two chairs. Notably, there's no AC in the rooms, which should be fine given weather in the region, but I have no idea how comfortable the rooms would be on a rare 30C/85F day. Some jams set up as welcome gift, water delivered daily.

Our rate had breakfast included. It's a buffet with cheap industrial stuff, and you can order eggs to the table. Fish and meats (some of which were touted as being from a local butcher shop) were just ok, but fruits and pastries were poor. I'm not a breakfast eater, so if I'd been here without family, I would have skipped breakfast. The hotel wasn't anywhere near full, but already struggled with capacity issues at the restaurant. There were waits for tables, some guests seates in the lobby, and the buffet area is woefully undersized. Clientele 90% middle-class German, with a lot of sightings of guests packing up sandwiches for lunch.

I don't have much to compare this hotel to in the region, except Grand Hotel Heiligendamm (where Merkel held G7 meetings), which obviously is far better, but also costs 3x as much. That said, Boltenhagen is the most modern Lindner I've been to, and probably my #2 Lindner after Mallorca.

River in Sight

Thanks; when I went searching for threads on this hotel, I didn’t think to look in the overall Lindner thread.

Sounds like we had a similar experience. Perhaps I’ll check out the Mallorca Lindner someday; I agree with you that as far as Lindners go, Boltenhagen was in pretty good shape.

iahphx

I can't believe I'm the third Globalist to check into this obscure "Hyatt" this month! I can't add too much new to the great information provided above. I had seen jpdx's review before I arrived, but missed River in Sight's. That was a shame because we also had laundry to do and I would have loved doing it in Boltenhagen had I known it to be relatively simple. (We wound up doing it at an Eco Express laundromat in Lubeck -- tourist laundry isn't so easy in Germany).

We stopped for just a night here as we were travelling the German Baltic coast from Rugen Island (recommended -- Binz is a much more sophisticated beach town than Boltenhagen, but no hotel points options) to Kiel, where we boarded a cruise ship. Personally, unless I had nearly unlimited time, as a foreigner I wouldn't spend more than a night or two in Boltenhagen. It's certainly a pleasant, calm beach town, but it's geared toward Germans -- it's not special enough to be a true "international beach destination." The beach -- especially the main beach a mile or so from the hotel -- is pretty enough, but the water is pretty cold. There's not much to do in town except relax, swim and eat fish sandwiches.

But we enjoyed our stay. The hotel is pleasant as described above. It would benefit from AC, though. The high temp the day we arrived was only 79, but the room was hot and hard to cool off with only one 1 window. The Germans like to sleep with heavy duvets, and we had to take the insert out of the sheets in order to sleep comfortably with the window still open. We had just a "deluxe seaview" which I got without using a certificate. I did notice there were no suites available the day I checked in. The view of the harborfrom the balcony is certainly enjoyable.

Wismar IS a very pleasant stopover. Lubeck is also nice. We hit Wismar before arriving in Boltenhagen and Lubeck afterwards. Both towns were pretty easy to deal with having a car. BTW, I think the Lindner charges for parking, but we didn't have to pay as we were on a Globalist award stay. We also received the jams, which aren't the best gift if you're not checking luggage.

We liked the breakfast and thought it was better than just about any non-resort Hyatt Regency breakfast we've had. Lots of choices in a very nice, large dining room on the water.

Bottomline, as a Globalist, if you're passing through this area in summer, it's a no-brainer stopover.

River in Sight

I agree with everything you wrote. My family was in a somewhat different situation in that we spent several months in Europe this past year so we were just looking for something different to do. Although I found the week in Boltenhagen very relaxing, I definitely would not travel all the way from the US to spend a week there. As you said, the water is really too cold to enjoy as a proper beach destination. I only heard a handful of English speakers while we were there, virtually everyone was German.

We also hit Lubeck on this trip (which I thought was pleasant but I’m not sure I’d go out of my way for it) and I agree with you that Germany is very hard for laundry for travelers, much more so than other countries we’ve traveled to.

jpdx

I agree with both of you -- Boltenhagen is a low-key German destination that's not worth going out of the way for. We liked Wismar a lot, but found Lubeck a bit disappointing, with the exception of the border memorial, which had a number of exhibits in English and was attended by a very knowledgeable retired English teacher, who gave us a great tour with lots of insights about the former GDR-FRG border (might want to call ahead to see what her hours are). IME this is very uncommon for these smaller memorial sites, which are often hopeless unless you speak German (e.g., the Stasi museum in Leipzig). The most pleasant surprise in the area was the city of Schwerin, about an hour away from Boltenhagen.

If you drive, beware of an abundance of photo radar -- I generally drove at reasonable speeds, but still received a ticket in the mail from the town of Wohlenhagen (that longish stretch that goes by the beach is restricted to 40km/h for several miles, probably fine on busy weekends, but was completely deserted in shoulder season), and another one that was taken somewhere near Klutz.

iahphx

Photo radar is the bain of all travellers. I'll keep my fingers crossed I got no tickets. I did notice some "absurd" 40 kph speed zones in the area. Hope I saw them all. German driving is a bit odd for Americans. We all know of the speed limit-less autobahn, but Germany also has many roads where you see speed limit signs that seem batshit crazy low. If there's no slow German driver in front of you, I could see how you could easily get a radar camera ticket somewhere.