Jinsha Bandao Lakeview Yangsheng Hotel

This hotel is located in Xia Guan area. I decided to go for this hotel in the first day of my trip to Dali because I want to explore Er Hai lake area before spending more time in the Old City. I also booked a car with a driver to bring me explore the surrounding of the Er Hai lake and it would take half day to run around the lake and stop for few tourism spots for short break or photo shooting. It is a nice hotel, staff service attitude is very good, very helpful and polite, with good initiative to give some info on the directions when asked. The property is well maintained in term of cleanliness. The location of the hotel is a bit far from tourism spots, such as three pagodas, old city, cang shan etc. Therefore, if you wanna stay or experience the facility in this hotel, such as pool and spa, you can spare 1 or max 2 days in the hotel just to have your relax time. For those who like biking, you can also find a bike rental that could let you enjoy a bit of exercise with lake scenery. Looking for a taxi was a bit difficult. I was once wanna go to city center and tried to wait for a taxi infront of the hotel. There were seldom taxi passed by and most of it were occupied. There was also a woman standing besides me who also waiting a taxi. We ended up sharing a private car (illegal taxi) to our destination after waiting for more than 15 minutes. The "illegal taxi" here refers to a private car who gives service like a taxi with no meter, so we need to bargain for the price before we agree to ride on it. Breakfast is a bit common, and I do think the quality of the food should be improved. Don't really recommend you to take this hotel booking including the breakfast. During my stay there, there were a lot of tourists storming the breakfast even it was still very early. Therefore the hotel staff was a bit busy and try to refill some dishes which was easily gone few minutes after it was served.