Silks Place Taroko Hotel Hualien

Picturesque location, good sized rooms (though bath is very small,) overall well priced. Good food at the buffet & love the fact that main meals are cooked on order. Great entertainment provided at the hotel, too. Architecture & decor is fantastic - modern, simplistic yet still warm and inviting. However, service wasn't very good. Had to continuously ask for things in the restaurant (coffee refill, fresh milk, etc) but the major problem was drinks on the rooftop. There is no bar or drinks station, and every time you want a drink you have to go inside the VIP lounge. Our order was forgotten a few times. We were also interested in having coffee in the art gallery, and even wanted to buy some art. But there wasn't anyone ever servicing the cafe there - so no coffe, and sadly no art came home with us. In saying that, we would like to return to the hotel again next year.

Silks Place Taroko is located in one of the most beautyful spots in the Taroko Gorges. two scenic bridges a modern temple with a pagoda are at a stone throuw from the hotel (ok, the pagoda is made in concrete, but it is still quite picturesque). The western-style restaurant and the buffet offer excellent quality and amazing quantity of food for a reasonable price. Bicycle can be rented from the Hotel shop for NT450 for the entire day. Finally, for NT350 the hotel provides a pick-up service at Hualien station and airport. This is really helpful because there is no public transport from Hualien to Tianxing (where the hotel is located) later that 13.50. Overall, if want to visit Taroko and have a bit of money to spend, this is the Hotel you want to stay in!

Fantastic service and outstandingly child friendly. Highly recommend this hotel.

Excellent hotel in superb location, stayed in a mountain view room which was actually inner yard view which is actually japanese style yard with lots of bamboo and stones. Excellent breakfast. At this time there is a frequent public bus (free!! - run by the local government) from the train station in Hualien to Tianxiang (hotel's location), and it stops on the way at all major sites.

The Hotel is great. The staff is wonderful and very friendly and helpful. However, the two restaurants in the hotel serve very mediocre food. There are no other restaurants in the area, so you don't really have any other choices. Too bad the Hotel can't realize how much better it would be if the food quality was improved.

The hotel is rather run-down from the outside. We were given a room facing a wall in the basement, but upon request, we were given another room with a view. There is a wide breakfast selection, although it is the same each day. The staff are friendly and ever ready to assist.

The Grand Formosa is a very dated concrete 1970's design hotel. It is however set in a great location for all the sights of Taroko Gorge. I suspect due to lack of competition, the rooms though clean and presentable are very dated- our room had a glass pane between the bathroom and to the bedroom (why?) and the whole room looked onto a sparse central concrete courtyard. The food is not very good (poorly cooked with poor ingredients) considering the availability of excellent quality cuisine elsewhere in Taiwan. The hotel staff are very helpful and will lend you flashlights for those dark-tunnelled walking trails. Overall convenient location but the hotel needs some competition to motivate it to update and improve its quality.

Mountain or river view rooms are the best. Interior rooms look onto each other and large courtyard.... no privacy!

A well maintained hotel in a beautiful setting. Reasonable dining facilities for Western and Chinese tastes. Courteous and efficient staff.

I just stayed at the Grand Formosa for 3 nights. The location can't be beat, and if you don't have a car/scooter/bike, I highly recommend you stay here as you are in the park and can easily access the hiking trails via shuttle, bus and taxi.

It's not quite 5 star, but the staff is very friendly and it's in a great location. We had an inside-facing room (not facing the river) and had 2 great nights of sleep. I've heard that the river-facing rooms are better (for the view), but you're going to spend all day staring at that river anyway. I also liked the design of the room - very daring to have a window from the bathtub to the bedroom. I took my baby daughter to swim in the downstairs indoor pool and she loved it. It was a bit early in the year to swim in their outdoor, top-of-the-roof pool, but that pool was beautiful. The food at the hotel is extremely boring. This is probably very helpful to the foreigners staying there, but I'm sure they can come up with better dishes to satisfy non-adventurous palates without resorting to pasta (in Taiwan?), mortadella-like cold cuts (once again, in Taiwan?), or plates of sliced cheese.

Well situated, friendly and helpful staff. We had an enjoyable stay in beautiful and interesting surrounds. Highly recommended.

the Grand Formosa is an excellent option to explore Taroko National Park. Looking at the facade of the hotel a paint job may do. However, the rooms are clean and spacious. The facilities are - for such a location - very good. The service received by the staff was warm and friendly. There are two restaurants in the hotel and both serve decent food (one Chinese, the other buffet). I would definitely choose the Grand Formosa again.

Instead of rushing all the way back to Hualien city , this is a good hotel to stay over a night after all the walking in Taroko. Price a bit pricey , however, there is swimming pool , a reasonable game room .. foc billiard and table tennis. There is cultural show on weekend night. Take a torch and wonder out at night time .. it is a different feeling. plan your dinner and breakfast well .. to avoid the tour group crowd. We took a 4 bed room .. it is spacious and can actually, take in another 4 person with sleeping bags. If you on the free and easy .. try their ala carte menu , instead of buffet. reasonable price and taste good .... ..:-)

Very comfortable and spacious rooms, lovely outdoor pool and free shuttle bus to and from train station. Food not up to 5* standard and they could provide more help to get to the different sights/walks in the Taroko Gorge for those guests without cars.

The hotel is in the TienShang about 40km from Hualien. Its very remote and nothing else in the area but a great escape from the busy city. The hotel looks a bit basic but is surrounded by a gorgeous backdrop of mountains and greenery. Staff are very friendly and helpful. The food from the buffet was pretty good with a decent variety to please most. I plan to stay there again but for a longer period of time in order to explore the surrounding hiking trails as we only had time to cover 2 of the trails in 1 day.

the hotel is located at a very secluded place but that's the point of a breakaway from city life. the food in hotel is very expensive. food are seriously limited. other than that, everything was perfect. thing to improve is the transportation to the hotel is not well marketed. alot of distractions from local transports preventing us to find out more information about the hotel's transport.