Clarion Hotel® Ernst

Best stay in Kristiansand, at this Hotel you are not only treated as a guest your are treated as you are on a home visit due to the warm and welcoming staff. The Hotel has a stunning and spaceious lobby and there are nice and elegant interior in the rooms. The breakfast have all you can desire.

Absolutely lovely hotel, beautiful rooms, delicious breakfast and great service. Location in center of town and close to the harbor if you are going to travel :) we love staying at hotel Ernst and will definitely be staying many more times.

Good location as very central to town. This hotel used to be the best in Kristiansand but the outdated and increasingly shabby decor means that it no longer merits that title. Standards of cleanliness in the rooms is generally good and the breakfasts are of good variety and quality.

Location: Very central, in walking distance to both the waterfront, the outskirts and main city, as well as almost directly opposite the bus station and the ferries. So the location is very good if you don't want a lot of travel time (I did not need public transport or a taxi at any point). On the flipside, it is of course near a bigger road. Hotel: The hotel was extremely clean and some of it is extremely beautiful, particularly the main stairs. It also has a gym and sauna that you don't have to pay extra for. I did use the gym a little, but as I don't often go to the gym, I will refrain from reviewing it since I hardly have anything to compare it with, but it was clean and pleasant. I didn't have much need for the staff's help but my impression was that they were very helpful, friendly and efficient. They have a bar that I didn't go to but the breakfast was really good! It did have variety but perhaps less so than other hotels of this standard, BUT the quality of the food was better than most hotels. Room: I stayed in a smaller room for solo travellers. Based on the reviews I had read beforehand, I was expecting it to be small, dark and without a window. It was definitely small for a 4-star hotel but it was not uncomfortably small and was very well decorated. There was a window down to the reception hall, which of course means there is no beautiful view of the harbour or city, but it worked much better than I had expected and was actually quite charming. The hotel is near a big road and my room near the bar, so there was some noise but once I closed the window, it faded into just being white noise, so it is definitely soundproofed, but something to keep in mind if that is a big bother for you. All in all, I would recommend and stay there again but keep in mind that some of the rooms are smaller than average and that is isn't located in the middle of a quiet forest.

The hotel called me on the evening on my stay shortly before getting on my delayed flight asking if I was coming, I told them yes and that my flight was delayed a bit, and they said everything was fine. Then not long after, as my flight was about to take off, they call me and tell me I'll have to find another hotel because all their rooms have been fully booked?! I booked in advance though?? Moving to a different hotel would be very inconvenient for my job the next morning, so I showed up anyways and insisted on getting my room, where they oh so graciously offered to DOWNGRADE ME to a single room... Not only trying to unilaterally cancel my room on the date of my stay, but "offering" to downgrade me or find a different hotel... Beyond unprofessional, I've never experienced any hotel with this level of incompetence. When I had to accept their downgrade option, did they offer any form of compensation? No, I had to ask for the manager before they offered any form of compensation for the inconvenience and distress their unprofessional hotel management had caused me. It was very unprofessional to give my room to someone else.