Quite possibly the worst hotel in the world is the Ryugyong Hotel in Pyongyang, North Korea. This is not because the hotel is infested with bed bugs, or has crappy service, pay-for-WiFi or outrageous valet parking charges.
Nope, it's the worst hotel in the world because it has been abandoned for over 16 years with construction on the 105-storey pyramid-shaped hotel halted in 1992. It's never even hosted hotel guests. Oh yeah, and it's in North Korea.
Indeed, it's been dubbed "The Hotel of Doom" and the "Phantom Hotel." And if you think it doesn't look so bad, ugh. Check it in Google Earth.
The Ryugyong Hotel, aka Dr. Evil's secret hideout hotel, never fails to fascinate us, even though it will more than likely never see an actual guest. The DPRK has actually struck the hotel from all official maps, and we hear many tour guides won't even confirm Ryugyong's existence. Ha. Yeah, the big, ominous, monolithic structure in the middle of town, that just so happens to be the seventh tallest building in the world doesn't exist.
So if Ryuguyog is a figment of your imagination, where do you stay if you visit Pyongyang? Well, more than likely you will stay at, Koryo Hotel, the second largest hotel in North Korea (also the second highest building in the panoramic photo above), and one of the DPRK's fully operational hotels.
While the entryway of a 30-foot wide jade dragon mouth that leads into an expansive lobby some guests have been less than impressed with the power of Koryo:
·This hotel is rated as 5 stars by the DPRK tourism officials. The atmosphere and the attention for detail however are definitely NOT up to usual 5 star standards.
·There is also a "restaurant number 1" and "number 2". One of them has a nice view over the river. Service is not great and not fast, and we got the set menu.
·There are about three channels on TV, the guards wouldn't let me go off the premises, and very few if any spoke English.
But you don't have to stay at Koryo, right? You have choices. Um, well, not really, according to another tipster:
You have no choice of accommodation. It will be at one of the two modern-ish tower hotels where you'll be one of very few guests and your fellow guests tend to be from places like Cuba, Mozambique (and other T.P.L.A.C.'s) and Libya. Makes for interesting post-dinner conversation.
Irrelevant - it's all part of your package, and that costs a mint.
[Publisher's note: dzot, a hotel maven with tenure around these parts, fondly recalls his first encounter with us, which involved our 2004 Best Hotel Villain. Enjoy.]
The first time I ever visited HotelChatter was when another site linked to this post about the surreally eerie Ryugyong Hotel in North Korea.
DamnIntersting.com has posted even more info about this travesty.
The hotel, which was once found on city maps before the construction even began, has now been completely stricken from the official maps. Tour guides usually claim not to know where it is. Either a majority of the country is in a state of denial about the whole thing, or they avoid the subject for fear of reprisal. Since the government's embarrassing monument is visible from practically every point in the city, it's most likely the latter.
In the comments someone provided a link to this striking sat photo from Google Earth.
Bad as it is, at least they can claim as many guests as Las Ramblas.
If Dr. Evil was a real person, he would need a real hideout, and that real hideout may very well be The Ryugyong Hotel in Pyongyang, North Korea.
The giant dark monolith is 1,082 feet tall, has 105 floors, yet it is completely empty without a single window.
In one bloggers opinion the Ryugong Hotel is "the single most unsettling structure ever erected by the hand of man".
That same blog, Shape of Days, brings up a great question, which is why does Ryugyong Hotel exist in the first place? Certainly it is not to meet North Korea's mounting tourist demand. The hotel was designed to have 3,000 rooms, yet if every single Pyongyang area visitor booked a weeklong stay, the hotel would still be hanging a vacancy sign on the front door.
So why did North Korea build this not-so-secret-hideout-type structure? We agree with Shape of Days, gotta be national pride.
Unfortunately, looks like national pride gone terribly wrong. The North Korean's started this project back in 1987 and have spent around $750 million or 2% of the country's GDP on the Ryugyong Hotel.
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by juliana
