When planning where to stay during our 6 weeks in Kansas on our 5 year, 50 state road trip, we decided to visit Kansas City, despite most of the city’s fun stuff being on the Missouri side.
We’ll be returning to Kansas City in the future when we visit Missouri, so we weren’t worried about staying downtown for the time being. As a result, we looked for hotels in the Kansas City Metropolitan Area to the southwest of downtown.
There were quite a few good value options when using our hotel points, so we were spoiled for choice. I enjoy staying at Hyatt Place properties (here’s why) and there were three category 1 Hyatt Place properties on the Kansas side of Kansas City.
There didn’t seem to be much of a difference between the three properties, so I ended up picking the Hyatt Place Kansas City/Lenexa City Center at random. It thankfully ended up being a good choice as the room was comfortable (as always) and the service was even better than normal.
We ended up staying at the Hyatt Place Kansas City/Lenexa City Center for six nights, so here’s a complete review of our stay.
Check-In
Before arriving in Lenexa, we’d been staying in Parsons, about 2-2.5 hours south of there. Our checkout time at that hotel was 11am, so we knew we’d get to Lenexa earlier than the standard check-in time of 3pm, even taking into account a visit to Big Brutus (the World’s Largest Electric Shovel) along the way.
I checked in online that morning before we left and noted that we’d likely arrive at 2:30pm. I subsequently received an email a couple of hours before that time advising that our room was ready.
That meant the check-in process once we arrived at the hotel was quick and easy. Sam and Courtney checked us in and they were both extremely friendly and welcoming. We’re traveling with our dog Truffles, but I can’t remember whether we had to complete a pet form or not.
We chatted to Sam and Courtney for a couple of minutes, then headed up to room 210.
Bedroom
When entering the room, the bathroom was immediately to the right, the living room area through the door on the right and the bedroom area beyond that.
The living room area had Hyatt Place’s familiar corner sofa, along with a couple of side tables and an ottoman. The ottoman was slightly lower than the sofa which I find to be more comfortable on the rare occasions I actually use it as a footrest (some Hyatt Place ottomans are higher than the sofa which is less comfortable). More often than not though, we use it as a coffee table and so its height isn’t as important in that scenario.
On the opposite side of the room was a desk and office chair. There was quite a lot of floor space between which helped make the room feel more spacious.
To the right of the desk was a cupboard and dresser, with the TV mounted above those.
That cupboard housed a mini-fridge which had a dial to control the temperature.
The room’s closet was to the right of the dresser and contained a spare pillow (for the sofa bed), an iron, ironing board and luggage rack.
Opposite the closet was the room’s king bed. The bed and pillows were fantastically comfortable as always, while the room’s blinds worked well at night to keep the room dark.
Both sides of the bed had lamps which each had a couple of power outlets – a feature I always appreciate.
Bathroom
When entering the bathroom, the sink, vanity and toilet were on the right. Although it didn’t have a long countertop, there was a lot of surface area around the sink to place our toiletries, along with a shelf beneath.
Speaking of toiletries, they were the standard Barney Kenet MD toiletries you get at all Hyatt Places.
The bathroom had a good-sized walk-in shower. The water pressure of the shower was good and the water heated up quickly.
I always like our rooms at Hyatt Places and this was no exception. While it didn’t have a wet bar like some other Hyatt Places offer, the room felt more spacious than normal.
Breakfast
When you stay at a Hyatt Place, you get free breakfast so long as you’re a World of Hyatt member and you book directly with them (i.e. not via an OTA like Expedia, Hotels.com, etc.).
Breakfast was served until 9am on weekdays and until 10am (I think) on weekends. This was a minor disappointment for me as I prefer when breakfast goes on until 9:30am on weekdays as it means I don’t have to get up so early, but that’s just me.
There were always four hot options every morning. Scrambled eggs and a garlic-herb potato medley were offered every morning…
…while the other two hot items differed each day. The day I took the photos there was bacon and pancakes, while other mornings included sausage links, corned beef hash and more.
The other breakfast options remained the same each day:
For drinks, there were three types of fruit juice, milk and a coffee and tea station.
Seating is all throughout the lobby area, so there was never any shortage of tables and chairs to sit at.
Amenities
The Hyatt Place Kansas City/Lenexa City Center has several amenities for guests to use. There’s an indoor swimming pool that was heated nicely, although there wasn’t a whirlpool.
For other exercise, there’s a fitness room with a few more pieces of equipment compared to normal. Another nice feature of this Hyatt Place’s fitness room was that the temperature could be controlled by guests.
They have a laundry area, but for whatever reason our room key wasn’t working to let me in there to take a photo. I could see through the window though that it cost $3 per load in both the washing machine and dryer which is a little more expensive than most other guest laundry services we’ve had at other hotels.
If you need to use the internet or print something during your stay, there’s a business center just off the lobby which has three computers and a printer in the corner.
If you want to hang out with family, friends or colleagues, there’s lots of seating in and around the lobby…
…as well as outdoor seating areas at both the front and rear of the hotel. The polar vortex hit during our stay (we stayed at the end of January/beginning of February 2019), so we didn’t take advantage of this.
This hotel has the Lenexa Convention Center attached to it, so there are all kinds of meeting and conference rooms you can book.
Pet Friendliness
The Hyatt Place Kansas City/Lenexa City Center is a pet-friendly hotel. That’s one of the reasons we chose it as we’re traveling with our dog. The only pet fee listed on their website is $75, so I’m assuming that’s regardless of length of stay. Most pet-friendly Hyatt Places charge $75 for 1-6 nights, but then add on an extra $100 if you stay longer than that, but this property doesn’t appear to charge that extra $100 for longer stays. Having said that, if you’re planning on staying here with a dog for a week or more, I’d check with them first if that’s the case, or take a screenshot of their website to dispute a higher charge.
Your dog can weigh up to 50 lbs, with a maximum combined weight for two dogs of 75 lbs. We thankfully don’t ever have to worry about weight limits seeing as Truffles is only ~11 lbs.
There are a couple of small grassy areas around the hotel (most of the hotel’s perimeter is mulch rather than grass), with a small designated pet area on the left side of the building between the hotel and neighboring Ignite restaurant.
If you want to take your dog to an off-leash dog park, you’re in luck. That’s because there are at least half a dozen within about 15-20 minutes of the hotel. We took Truffles to a couple of different ones during our six night stay. The first was Leawoof Dog Park in Leawood. This had separate areas for large and small dogs and was fairly muddy when we visited due to the recent snow and rain.
We only went to that dog park once as we discovered a different one that we liked even more. Stoll Off-Leash Dog Park is in Thomas S. Stoll Memorial Park in Overland Park and was lovely. It’s set over 7 acres and has a half-mile long paved path taking you around the dog park. In the center is lots of grass (and mud when we visited) for dogs to play as well.
One thing to be aware of is that there aren’t separate small and large dog areas – everyone’s all together. All the dogs we met were friendly though and their owners all seemed to be attentive.
Service
Service at the Hyatt Place Kansas City/Lenexa City Center was absolutely fantastic. Every member of staff was friendly and welcoming and they wished us a good day and welcomed us back every single time we left or returned.
Sam and Courtney in particular were wonderful and gave us some excellent suggestions of things to do in the area. Quite a few of them were on the Missouri side of Kansas City, so we’ve saved those recommendations for when we visit Missouri in the future. They suggested some other fun things to do on the Kansas side though, one of which was Stone Pillar Vineyard & Winery. That was such an excellent recommendation, we visited twice!
Wi-Fi
The hotel’s Wi-Fi is free for guests and was a good speed.
Location
Based on what we saw, Lenexa is an up-and-coming area. Not up-and-coming in that it used to be shady but it’s cleaning up its act, but more that there’s simply a lot of construction going on. The immediate area therefore doesn’t seem too exciting right now, but I can imagine it’ll be a much more interesting place to visit/live in the next few years once more shops and businesses move in, along with renters and homeowners.
The good thing is that Lenexa isn’t far from downtown Kansas City, along with the other cities in the Kansas City Metropolitan Area like Overland Park and Olathe. There are all kinds of restaurants, movie theaters, grocery stores, etc. that are a short drive away from the hotel, so it’s certainly not a bad place to be based.
Parking
The hotel offers free parking to all its guests and there are plenty of spots. Due to the convention center being attached to the hotel, you might have to park a little further away from the entrance if it’s busy.
Cost
I mentioned at the beginning of the review that we booked our stay using points. That’s because the Hyatt Place Kansas City/Lenexa City Center is a category 1 property and so only costs 5,000 World of Hyatt points per night. We therefore used 30,000 points to pay for our six night stay.
If we’d paid cash, the rate would’ve been $139.83 per night including tax. That means we got 2.8cpp (cents per point) of value out of our Hyatt points which is pretty good value.
Final Thoughts
I’m glad that when choosing which of the three category 1 Hyatt Places in the Kansas City area to stay at, I picked the one in Lenexa. I’m sure the others are perfectly fine too, but the Lenexa property has a fantastic team working there. Our room also felt slightly more spacious than your average Hyatt Place room; I’m not sure if it’s actually larger or if it’s just laid out in a way that makes it feel like that.
Truffles Approval Rating
Truffles gives the Hyatt Place Kansas City/Lenexa City Center four paws out of four – pawfect! They had a reasonable pet fee for a six night stay and there was enough grass and mulch around the hotel for her to do her stuff.
She also loved how much attention she got from the front desk staff. Many of them fawned over her, so she always tried running behind the front desk to say hi to them whenever we walked through the lobby.
An added bonus was being so close to several dog parks, especially the Stoll Off-Leash Dog Park.
Our Rating
Room = 4.5 / 5
Hotel Amenities = 4.4 / 5
Food = 4.5 / 5
Location = 4.0 / 5
Service = 4.9 / 5
Overall Value = 4.7 / 5 (n.b. this rating is based on the fact that we used points)
Total = 4.5 / 5
Address
Hyatt Place, 8741 Ryckert St, Lenexa, KS 66219
Leave a Reply