My wife and I toured around the west and centre of Cuba in March/April as part of a self-drive holiday with accommodation on a B&B basis and car hire booked in advance through Voyager Cuba (UK) ([-]) and Captivating Cuba (Cuba) ([-]). Both are highly recommended.
Our flight was with Cubana Airlines from London Gatwick (a low budget airline with no in-flight entertainment). If you do fly with Cubana then we would recommend an upgrade to premier class (better food and spacious comfy seats for the nine hour flight).
Please see our other reviews for Carrusel La Granjita (near Santa Clara), Iberostar Hotel Grand (Trinidad), La Union Hotel (Cienfuegos), Villa Soroa (near Soroa).
We arrived here at 4am (after an eight hour delay at London Gatwick) and stayed for three nights.
Even in the early hours of the morning there were plenty of staff on duty (English spoken by reception staff).
The whole place had a very welcoming, friendly feel about it, in a great position in central Habana.
You can spend a good few hours wandering round the lobby areas just looking at the photographs of the famous and infamous people who stayed here in pre-revolution days and soaking up the history of the place.
There's an arcade of tourist shops and a tourist office to book guided tours of the city.
This is well worth it as an introduction to Habana.
We had a very personal service, a great guide and tour.
There is plenty of security at the hotel entrance and the immediate area just outside the hotel was quiet and felt very safe, with none of the main street hustle and bustle (and hassle) you get at some other Habana hotels fronting onto main thoroughfares.
We had a spacious and quiet room on the upper floor at the front of hotel with fantastic views across the city .
The room decor and fittings were quite worn and jaded but there was a big comfy bed.
As with many hotels in Cuba you need to bring your own universal bath plug if you want to use the bath rather than the shower.
The temperature of hot water seemed to fluctuate with peak demand (so get up early to beat the rush).
The air conditioning was through an integrated vent in the wall and was quite noisy.
It was fine for our time of visit in the spring but I reckon it would not be able to cope in the very hot summer period.
The breakfast area downstairs got quite hot and stuffy and very busy.
There was a good choice of reheated tourist quality buffet food to choose from - but also freshly cooked omelettes.
We discovered breakfast was also served in the rooftop restaurant for a 5 CUC supplement - the same reheated tourist quality buffet food but worth it for the views and peace and quiet.
There's a lovely open courtyard cafe bar for freshly made snacks and good cuban coffee with a regular rotation of different musicians and a swimming pool - though we didn't try this out.
Visit the roof top restaurant in the evening for the views not the food!!!
The menu looked promising but the food choice was surprisingly limited for an upmarket Habana hotel restaurant (reheated pork/chicken and rice and beans) and we ate there only on the first night.
With so many great places to eat in Habana (especially the paladares rather than restaurants), we wouldn't recommend eating there more than once but the views overlooking the city and harbour and palatial splendour are amazing and the pianist was fantastic!

The hotel lobby is pleasant and full of character. The small courtyard bar has good service and a local band playing at most times.
However the room we stayed in was a different story. It may have been that we were only there for 3 nights of a 14 night package, but it was well past it's best. The maintenance was very poor with the door handles falling off, the shower dribbling and the shower screen leaking. Also the room badly needed decorating and the paintwork and floors in need of a good scrub.
The breakfast room was far too small and breakfast chaos. There were no tables, no organisation and no service. The tables were never laid and you had to go and find your own coffee, plates and cutlery if you were lucky. Mostly everything had run out and the only good things were the breads/buns and the omelettes although the queues were long.
The roof top restaurant was a dissapointment, the views nice but the food very average and pricy.

We stayed at the Sevilla for a couple of nights as part of our 'Natural Cuba' tour with the Travel Collection. We're glad we switched from the Miramar as the location of the Sevilla is fab for discovering central and Old Havana. Everything is in easy walking distance, although we did fulfil our dream of a cab ride in a 1950s car (blue plates, state owned). We might have tried the horse and trap man outside, but we'd already done that elsewhere.

As mentioned in the other recent reviews, we found the hotel a beautiful example of restored colonial splendour - in the public areas. Our room was OK. Fairly basic and no view, but it was fine, until the hot water ran out. Others had that problem too. Lifts were new and fast.

Thanks to reading other TripAdvisor reviews, we knew about the restaurant on the top floor. It is beautiful and airy and has the most amazing panoramic views across Havana. We had a lovely evening meal when we first arrived. Price wise, this was comparable with other meals we had out in Havana. Service was slow, but the food was good and the atmosphere made up for things with its pretty setting + very good pianist. We ate breakfast up there too, which wasn't included in our room rate, but available at a 5 CUC supplement each. Well worth it for the lack of queues, stacks of space and fresh air and the good guitarist.

Front desk staff were helpful with maps and and quick with problems we had with keys and loos. I wasn't convinced about the money exchange - no rate disaplayed and no receipt, but hey I was 'donating' money all over Cuba!

Entertainers we saw in the lobby were excellent and we bought a great CD from the band that played in the courtyard. NB: Buying CDs is a useful way of giving money to people who entertain you. We bought loads - most work fine, some don't register on certain CD players back home.

All in all, I'd recommend the Sevilla to anyone wanting to be in the centre with some colonial style.

As the Parque Central was fully booked,we chose this hotel for its location and pool and were not disappointed by these. Previous commentators describe the location very well. Worried by less complementary reviews, I opted to book superior rooms, but am not really sure if this was justified. One of the rooms was certainly huge, but the other only average and smelt damp. Our shower was broken so that it pointed its jet at the wall and at a height of 4 feet. The beds were very comfortable,however, and although we were near the lifts the "bings" did not offend until it was probably time to get up anyway! Our rooms were clean and we had spectacular towel art, perhaps in appreciation of the gifts and tips we left. The rooms did not have the views I'd hoped for by paying extra as they were on the wrong side of the hotel.The lifts worked fine.My advice would be to book standard rooms, ask to see them first and remember that the hotel is 100 years old, so wear and tear is to be expected. The breakfast is served on the ground floor to all B&B guests This was much to my disappointment, as I had assumed we could breakfast in the roof garden restaurant. We never did manage to eat there. Maybe it's better to be room only and then pay separately for breakfast if you wish to benefit from the roof restaurant with its famous panoramic view. This is certainly worth checking out. It looked fabulous on our fleeting visit,the first morning, before we were hurriedly dispatched downstairs, an explanation provided in Spanish, which we did not understand.
As mentioned in other reviews, the breakfast area downstairs was always busy and the speed of response shown by the waiting staff never seemed to match the needs of the room or the guests. On our last day the room was packed and the hot buffet had empty containers which were not being replenished at 9 a.m. We ate snack food in the El Patio Bar a few times, which was OK and thoroughly enjoyed the free entertainment. The interpersonal skills of some of the staff in the hotel left a lot to be desired.We had mixed weather whilst in Havana, but on our one hot day the pool offered a pleasant relaxing area after a morning sight -seeing and the pool was inviting even if the water was cold.We ate well throughout our 4 days. Los Nardos served very good food, huge portions and was reasonably priced, but we had to wait nearly an hour before being permitted inside, when we then had to wait for another 10 minutes before being seated. Friendly service and great ambiance. We ate at Tien Tan in China Town.The walk to it took us through some 'interesting' backstreets, and we had to run the gauntlet past several other Chinese restaurants to get to it, but the food was good, if on the pricey side. We also ate in a tiny restaurant housed in the Edificio Bacardi, the fabulous art deco building minutes from the Hotel. The food was fairly predictable, but the waiters who were delightful, and the spectacular building, made it a really memorable experience.