Hotel berhampiran Vistarheimið, Runavik

This is a 3 star rated hotel and I think that’s about right. When you visit the spectacular Faroe Islands you need to realise you will not find your large brand name shopping malls restaurants and hotels you see everywhere else. So what you get with this hotel is a steady Eddie place to rest with a great restaurant on site. If you get a 3rd or 4th floor room facing the harbour, you get great views. The bed is large and comfortable, soft and spongy. The Room is a good size and has a fridge. The bathroom is very basic, functional but basic. The tv has only 10 channels, all local and none English speaking. This isn’t a traditional hotel. If you are here for a few days and need a base to explore, this could be it. But it has no facilities if you are staying longer and want to spend more time in the hotel. I enjoyed my short stay. Would have no issues returning.

The room is fine if there’s only 1 person. With 2 people sharing – there’s NO PRIVACY. The door into the hotel room opens in the bathroom area, so If you’re stepping out of the shower when your roommate is going in or out of the room, anyone passing by will see. There is nowhere to change clothes in private. A sliding wall tries to separate the bed area from bathroom but not efficiently and makes a loud noise, which can disturb someone sleeping. Shower stall has a door - no lock. Toilet has same door - No lock & doesn’t close all the way so your roommate hears and smells everything, no matter what part of the room he is in. The toilet flushes VERY LOUDLY – turbo flush and since there’s no real door, it will wake up the other person sleeping. The shower was large but smells like mold. The toilet & shower have their own light switches. If you want to use the light over the sink, your only choice is to turn on all the lights in the room, which includes the bed area. So, if someone is sleeping, you can’t use the sink mirror. The bed was comfortable. Large closet - open to room. Bring extra hangers. Only 1 drawer in room; we had to pile our clothes on the couch. There was nowhere to put luggage. The second drawer has a safe with no room for anything more. Window opens but we could smell cigarettes from outside even though we were on the 3rd floor. (Hotel has only 4 floors.) We didn’t need AC in August but that may not always be the case. So, I’m not sure if the AC works well; the lowest it would go was low 70s. AC is a foreign concept there. Not a lot of TV channels in English, only BBC & Sky news. You can pair your phone to tv to watch Netflix. General Pros: We got breakfast included in the room price for about $20/day. It was a good amount of choices; had bread & cold cuts to make sandwiches for the road. Supermarket/liquor store - 5 min walk. In room: Refrigerator, Hot water maker with tea/coffee/sugar. No microwave. Laundry – there is 1 washer and dryer that are free to use (and there was free soap!) but the dryer didn’t dry our clothes well. Bring extra hangers. Not much of a selection at the hotel restaurant and bar but the cheeseburger & fries from the bar was good - $32. Dinner and drinks are expensive. The cheapest gin & tonic was about $18. Sparkling water (bottle) is about $8. You can get a free glass of wine (1/2 a glass) or beer at the bar between 5-6 PM. We didn’t need local currency because everywhere takes credit cards and tipping is not expected. General Cons: Not much within walking distance of hotel but the bus is free – you just need to figure out how to use it. The hotel doesn’t help with details or maps. No restaurant within walking distance. Hot tub is about $20 per person for 45 mins. You need to make a reservation to use it. Hotel ran out of wash clothes after 1st day. Ironing board was broken.

We had a family room, which was actually two rooms linked together. That worked really well, not least as then we had two bathrooms. The beds were comfortable and I like that you can also request a variety of pillows. The rooms were very hot and you can't change the temperature. I had to request a fan, but they only had a tiny one. I really think you should be able to adjust the temperature in your own room, as we were quite uncomfortable. Also, I think the bathroom was somewhat style over function, as the showers look nice but were quite small, with an awkward door. For us vegans, the breakfast buffet was okay. There was muesli, bread, cucumbers, tomatoes, some fruit (grapes one day, melon another), oat milk, pea milk, and beans. The staff brought us vegan butter. For non-vegans, there was meat, eggs, smoked salmon, etc. It was nice that they offer a happy hour with a free wine or juice. The hotel has hot tubs, but you have to pay 150 DKK per person to use them, which is quite a lot when you compare that to the cost of going to the pool here, which includes hot tubs as well. Also, if you were just one person going to the hot tub alone, it would be 150 DKK, but for 4 people using it at the same time, it would be 600 DKK. That makes no sense. The hotel info says you need to give them 30 min notice to use the hot tub, but the staff told us it would take at least 60 min to heat it up, so we didn't bother. A final, tiny note -- the hotel has what they label a ”handicap toilet”. That's an offensive term in English now, so I was quite surprise to see that. It should be ”disabled toilet” or ”accessible toilet”. In short, it was quite a good hotel with a good location for visiting Torshavn and the rest of the Faroes.

We had some difficulty entering the premise initially, as I wasn’t aware I had to submit an online check-in prior to arrival at the property. Fortunately, I met a very resourceful local who’d manage to contact the owner to sort out the matter. After that, everything was smooth-sailing. The room was clean, kitchen well equipped, and the best selling point is the location. We enjoyed our stay a lot.

We had an excellent stay at the Hotel Torshavn. The room was very comfortable, the staff were efficient and friendly and the restaurant was excellent. A great place to stay and see the Faroes. We very much enjoyed visiting the many fascinating places on the islands.

The room was clean, and the bathroom was a bit impractical because you had to squeeze around the toilet to get in, but it all worked well. The breakfast was not very nice. The little sausage was greasy, and the egg was snoty, and the salmon was impossible to bite into the yoghurt, and granola was nice with the fruit. I found the steps leading up to my room where very slippery in the rain. All in all, it's not a bad hotel. There are a lot more better ones for a little bit more money.