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Starwood Element Vaughan Southwest - Almost Perfect
Starwood Element Vaughan Southwest – Almost Perfect
Matt and I were recently in Toronto, Canada for a one day Costco Mega Tour. The goal was to hit up eight locations, but in the end we only ended up walking seven locations. We missed one location, because the navigator, Matt, led us to a depot which was Costco’s Distribution Center (Matt’s edit: Still counts). We wanted to get an early start so we flew in from ORD late Friday night and stayed at the Starwood Element Hotel in Vaughan which is about 10 minutes from the airport.
When booking this hotel there was a cash & point option of 3,500 Starpoints and 55 CAD. As of looking today they only have the option of a free night at the rate of 7,000 Starpoints and paying for a night at 159 CAD. If you apply for the Starwood American Express Card, you can get 25,000 Starpoints and start growing a nice stash of Starpoints. You will get 10,000 after your first purchase and another 15,000 points after spending $5,000 in the first six months.
When we arrived at the Element, it was around 8:30pm (EST). We were promptly checked into our double queen bed room and I took the points as my platinum amenity.
We made it up to our room on the fourth floor where we entered via touch entry. You just tap the sensor and you don’t have to enter and remove your keycard anymore.
The room is laid out just like the other Element Hotels I have stayed at in Summerlin and Lexington. The only difference that I noticed was that instead of just having a standup glass enclosed shower, they had the shower / bathtub combo which is great for families but doesn’t look as eye appealing. Matt wasn’t too happy about the tub, he thought the standup shower was the better option.
The kitchen in the room is sporting all stainless steel appliances and has all the utensils needed to cook a nice pot of spaghetti, if that is your thing. I’m fonder of making a late night run to Little Caesars in bad parts of town, but that’s just me.
The downfall to the kitchen was the cleaning crew missed the last persons coffee filter so that wasn’t such a great find.
The beds were comfortable and beside that old coffee filter, the room was very clean.
They had your typical Element breakfast. They had a hot sandwich with egg, cheese, and ham. The berry smoothie tasted a little too watered down for me, and Matt thought it was sour. Beside the sandwich they also had all of your different types of cereal, breads and juices.
The pool at this Element location was an indoor pool which is a nice change, because they are typically outdoor pools.
In place of the outdoor pool, they have a very large outdoor seating patio that is filled with tables, chairs and heat lamps.
Overall this was a near perfect hotel experience. If it wasn’t for discovering the dirty, wet, soggy coffee filter, it would have been perfect. This hotel just recently opened a few months back, so I look forward to staying there in a year or so just to see how they are doing operationally wise.
