Hotel Review: Sonesta ES Suites Tucson, AZ

Shae and I stayed in Tucson twice this spring so that we could get both our first and second COVID vaccinations.

The first time was at the start of April and we stayed at the Country Inn & Suites Tucson Airport. We reviewed it when we stayed there last year and there’s not much to add other than the fact that the internet connection was appalling, so we probably wouldn’t stay there again due to that (we both work online, so we need good internet).

For our second stay in May we were originally planning on staying at the Hyatt Place Tucson Airport. However, we subsequently found a good paid rate for a two bedroom suite at the Sonesta ES Suites Tucson and so booked in there instead.

It was our first stay at any Sonesta brand and it was a solid enough place to stay, although it felt a little bit like a poor man’s Residence Inn which, coincidentally, was the brand this specific property was before becoming a Sonesta ES Suites.

Here’s a full review of our stay at the Sonesta ES Suites Tucson, AZ.

Check-In

The person checking us in was friendly and it didn’t take too long before we had our keys to room 1524.

The Sonesta ES Suites Tucson is an apartment-style property with 16 residential buildings mostly laid out in an L shape, with a few buildings in the center including the lobby.

With our suite being 1524, we were in building 15 and on the second floor in 1524. One of the nice features of this kind of layout is that you have more privacy and it’s quieter than your standard hotel or motel that has an interior or exterior hallway respectively.

The downside for us (but not necessarily most guests) is that you enter the second floor apartments by walking up stairs. That in itself wasn’t a hardship, but moving everything in to the suite has more of a hassle as there was no luggage cart or elevator. We travel with pretty much everything we own and so bring more stuff in to hotels than your average person; that’s why it was a downside for us, but likely not for most people.

Suite 1524 was accessed down the path to the right of the building, with the stairs leading up at the back. Although that meant we had a little further to walk with our bags, it did give us more privacy and a quieter stay than if our entrance had been at the front of the property.

2 Bedroom Loft Suite With Fireplace

The suite’s entrance led straight into the living room. The living room was on the left, the kitchen on the right, the downstairs bedroom and bathroom was straight ahead through double doors, while the second bedroom and bathroom were upstairs.

Here’s a video walkthrough of the suite to give you a better sense of how it was laid out:

In case you’d rather see photos rather than a video, here’s more detail about how it was laid out.

Living Room

The living room had a sleeper sofa and armchair, along with a rolling ottoman/coffee table. The lamp next to the armchair had a small shelf on it halfway up which was useful, while there was a side table at the far end of the sofa.

The TV was on top of a dresser and there was a fireplace in the living room too. I mentioned in the video that I wasn’t sure if it was a working fireplace or just purely decorative. With it being 90° out during our stay, we never ended up investigating if it was a gas fireplace or not. Having said that, I’ve since noticed that The Shoppe (see the ‘Amenities’ section later on in the review) sells fire logs, so it seems like it’s a proper fireplace rather than decorative or a gas fire.

The hotel had a pretty good selection of channels on the TV. It was helpful having a list of the channels, but unfortunately there was no menu on the TV listing what programs were on at the time, so we had to scroll through to see what was on.

Something I didn’t mention on the video because I hadn’t noticed it at the time is that there was an extra closet in the living room to the right of the suite’s entrance. It didn’t have anything in it, but it was useful having this extra storage space.

Kitchen

Next to the living room was a full kitchen, with a high dining table and chairs between the two rooms. The kitchen had a full-sized fridge-freezer, dishwasher, oven and stove top and microwave.

The cookware, silverware, plates, dishes, etc. were all in the dishwasher, presumably having been washed prior to our arrival. What was a little strange is that despite the kitchen having a full oven, there were no oven mitts, baking tray, etc. to actually use the oven itself.

The kitchen only had one packet of dishwasher powder and no dishwashing soap. I don’t know if we got unlucky on that front or if the hotel is just really skimpy on that front, but it’s a shame they don’t provide more seeing as most people staying at their hotel is likely doing so for several nights.

Downstairs Bedroom

Something that was interesting about the property is that the layout was pretty much exactly the same as the suite we had at the Residence Inn Hartford Windsor, Connecticut. In hindsight, that shouldn’t be too surprising because the Sonesta ES Suites Tucson used to be a Residence Inn, so the two properties were presumably built using the same design.

There was one main difference though. Whereas the Residence Inn Hartford Windsor had a dining room and office area downstairs with a Murphy bed, the Sonesta ES Suites Tucson used that space as a separate bedroom. This had two queen beds and so wasn’t as an ideal sleeping situation for us as the upstairs bedroom which had one king bed, but we decided to sleep in this downstairs bedroom because it stayed much darker and quieter. I’m up later at night and Shae’s usually up earlier in the morning, so having double doors closing off the bedroom worked out better.

Opposite the queen bed on the left was a good-sized dresser and a TV.

Between the bedroom and the downstairs bathroom was another closet, this one having a solitary hanger.

Downstairs Bathroom

The downstairs bathroom had a bathtub with shower along with the toilet and sink. The water pressure of the shower was simply fantastic – one of the best showers we’ve had in the last 3.5 years of living in hotels.

What wasn’t as great was the water pressure of the toilet. Although it flushed, it always seemed to be thinking about whether or not it actually wanted to flush or not.

The bathroom had large toiletry dispensers rather than small bottles of shampoo, conditioner and shower gel.

Loft Bedroom

The second bedroom was upstairs on a mezzanine floor with a king bed. The downside of this mezzanine-style layout is that if someone uses the living room or kitchen, that’ll likely disturb the person sleeping upstairs due to both the noise and light (hence why we slept in the downstairs bathroom).

The bathroom had a wall-mounted TV and another closet containing an iron and ironing board.

This closet had five hangers, but that meant the entire two bedroom suite only had a total of six hangers – not many even in a regular hotel room, let alone a two bedroom suite like this. I’m not sure if that’s the case in all the two bedroom suites at the Sonesta ES Suites Tucson or if we just got unlucky with the relative shortage of them.

Upstairs Bathroom

Next to the upstairs bedroom was a second bathroom. There was a large sink and vanity set out separately, with the bathroom itself having a bathtub with shower and more wall-mounted large toiletry bottles like the downstairs bathroom had.

The toilet in the upstairs bathroom flushed even worse than the downstairs one.

Overall, it was a decent suite. The kitchen cupboards seemed a little dated and the dining table had a long crack in the top of it, but overall the place was in pretty good condition and was clean.

Breakfast

The Sonesta ES Suites Tucson provides a complimentary breakfast from 7:30am to 9:30am, but it’s nothing to write home about. It consisted of one packaged pastry, one oatmeal bar, a piece of fruit and a small bottle of water. This wasn’t a huge issue seeing as we had a full kitchen and so made our own breakfast, but considering we were more than a year into the pandemic when we stayed, it was a poor offering considering what a lot of other hotels now provide.

Amenities

A lot of people staying at the Sonesta ES Suites Tucson likely do so for an extended period of time, so the hotel has amenities that cater to that. There’s a guest laundry room with several washing machines and dryers for guests to use. The washing machines cost $2.25 per load, while the dryers cost $2 per load. That’s not too bad and having it on site is certainly more convenient than having to go to a launderette.

If you need laundry detergent, you can buy that from The Shoppe which is in the lobby opposite the front desk. In addition to detergent, they have snacks, drinks, frozen items, etc.

To help you find your way around, there was the sign below on site.

‘The Nest’ is apparently a hangout space just off the lobby which presumably doubles up as the breakfast area in normal times (I didn’t get a photo I’m afraid), while ‘The Soap’ is for the guest laundry room. Needless to say, ‘The Dip’ directs you to the outdoor swimming pool.

The hotel was limiting the number of people who could use the pool at the same time during our stay due to COVID. You therefore had to stop by the front desk to get a key if you wanted to go for a swim. I’m assuming you could book a time slot, but we didn’t use the pool during our stay. That also means I’m not sure if the pool was heated or not.

In addition to the good-sized pool, there was a small whirlpool.

With the Sonesta ES Suites Tucson formerly being a Residence Inn, it wasn’t too surprising to see a sports court as that’s a standard feature at that particular brand. Seeing as this was our first stay at a Sonesta ES Suites, I’m not sure if purpose-built properties have this amenity or if it’s only at converted properties like the one in Tucson.

Next to the sports court was an outdoor seating area with a couple of grills available for guests to use.

In an alcove to the right of the front desk was a small business center with a computer and printer.

Pet Policy

The Sonesta ES Suites Tucson is a pet-friendly hotel and they allow up to two pets per room. They charge a pet fee which varies depending on how long you’re staying:

• 1-3 nights = $25 + tax per night
• 4-29 nights = $75 + tax per stay
• 30+ nights = $150 + tax per stay

With us staying 9 nights, we should’ve been charged $75+ tax. When checking the card we used for incidentals though, it doesn’t look like they ended up charging a pet fee.

There are some grassy areas around the property, such as by the outdoor seating and grills (see earlier photo). There’s also a long pet area along the back of buildings 9-16; there might be one along the back of buildings 5-9 as well, although I didn’t check.

There’s a sidewalk along the front of the hotel, so you can safely take your dog for longer walks if you want. There’s also a nice dog park at Morris K. Udall Park a couple of miles away, so that’s another good option for having your pups stretch their legs.

COVID-19

There isn’t too much to say on the COVID front regarding how the hotel dealt with the pandemic. With all the hotel’s suites being spread out across 16 buildings and with private exterior entrances for each suite, you were never inside with other guests unless you were in the lobby or guest laundry area temporarily.

The hotel did still seem to be trying to be responsible though because they were limiting access to the pool during our stay (early May 2021). The front desk staff members were always wearing masks when we saw them, so that was good to see.

The slight negative point is that their COVID-affected breakfast offering was very poor – one of the worst to-go breakfasts we’ve had since the pandemic began.

Service

Service was mixed during our stay. The few times that we stopped by the front desk to check in, check out and pick up mail, the staff were friendly and so there are no complaints there.

Housekeeping didn’t seem as good though. We declined housekeeping during our stay and so that wasn’t an issue. However, we’d left a trash bag outside our room a few days before we checked out and it still hadn’t been picked up by the time we left. We could’ve called the front desk to ask them to pick it up, but it was surprising that housekeeping didn’t even give the suites a cursory glance each day to see if there was trash left outside.

There was also a broken bottle at the bottom of the stairs leading up to our suite, so there was glass scattered around. I’d seen housekeeping down there when we checked in, but they didn’t bother to clear it up. We called the front desk to report it, but had to report it a second time the following day because it still hadn’t been cleaned up. Even when cleaning up the broken glass, they left an empty plastic bottle that someone had littered, even though that was next to where the broken glass was scattered. It therefore felt like housekeeping at the hotel was putting in minimal effort.

Wi-Fi

The internet connection at the hotel was good, as was the speed. What was a little annoying is that we had to manually connect when turning our computers on in the morning, plus we had to reconnect at some point during the day every day, presumably 24 hours after we’d originally connected.

For me, that meant my connection died just after midnight each day which was annoying when I hit publish on a blog post at night, only to have it not work. For Shae, it meant her connection cut out in the middle of one or two of the online classes she teaches which was obviously far from ideal. I wish hotels would let you connect once and have that be it, or at the very least let you specify your length of stay when first connecting.

Wi-Fi is free for all guests, but if you register for the Sonesta Travel Pass loyalty program, you get free premium Wi-Fi. Despite booking our stay through Hotels.com, I registered with Sonesta Travel Pass on my phone, then connected to their Wi-Fi using my new membership details and got access to the premium Wi-Fi straight away.

Check-In & Check-Out Times

The check-in time is 4pm, while check-out is at 12pm.

Location

The hotel is on the eastern side of Tucson. There are grocery stores, restaurants, etc. within a few minutes and it’s about 15 minutes from Sabino Canyon to the north and Saguaro National Park East to the east.

Parking

It’s free to park at the hotel. Given the layout of the property with all of its separate buildings, it was always easy finding a parking spot outside of our building.

Cost

We booked our stay at the Sonesta ES Suites Tucson via Hotels.com. Studio suites were pricing out at about $80 per night including tax which was a reasonable cost considering how much some other hotels were charging and the fact that even studio suites have a full kitchen.

We wanted a separate bedroom though, so we booked the two bedroom loft suite for $98.10 per night including tax which was a great rate. We saved even more by paying for most of the stay with Hotels.com gift cards we’d bought for 20% off, so that took an extra ~$150 off our total cost.

Booking through Hotels.com also meant we picked up nine nights in their Rewards program. That’ll be worth $88.29 towards a free night in the future.

We don’t have any points in the Sonesta Travel Pass rewards program, but if we did it would’ve cost 20,000 points per night as this property is one of their Tier 5 hotels.

Final Thoughts

We had a good stay at the Sonesta ES Suites Tucson. It was great value and it was nice having such a spacious suite. At 900 sq ft, it was larger than the apartment we rented before setting off on our road trip. The skimpy breakfast was a little disappointing, although with a full kitchen we could easily take care of that ourselves.

I can’t really put my finger on why, but it felt a little like a poor man’s Residence Inn. Part of that is due to the fact that it was actually a Residence Inn once upon a time, but it just didn’t feel quite as nice as Residence Inns do. However, if we return to Tucson in the future, I’d be more than happy staying here again if the price was right.

Truffles Approval Rating

Truffles gives this hotel four paws out of four – pawfect! The pet fee they charge is reasonable seeing as it’s somewhat based on how long you stay. Having said that, it’s not like we were charged that fee anyway.

She also liked that there was a lot of space to walk around the property and that there was a dog park fairly close by. The layout of the property also meant that our suite was nice and quiet which she also appreciated.

Our Rating

Room = 4.7 / 5
Hotel Amenities = 4.6 / 5
Food = 3 / 5
Location = 4.4 / 5
Service = 4.0 / 5
Dealing With COVID-19 (A new – hopefully temporary – category for our hotel reviews) = 4.3 / 5
Overall Value = 4.8 / 5

Total = 4.26/5

Address

Sonesta ES Suites, 6477 E Speedway Blvd, Tucson, AZ 85710