Had a 2 night stay here in this relatively new build hotel. A free shuttle bus will take you to this hotel which is approx. 5 minutes’ drive. The minibus driver will meet you in arrivals and will be holding a guest’s name card. If he is not there, there are plenty of other hotel drivers hanging around that will want to know your hotel name and will guide you to the correct area for pick-up, however my advice is to stay at arrivals until the driver appears.
The hotel comprises of 11 floors, with floor 11 being a restaurant. I initially booked a ‘KING DELUXE ROOM WITH VIEW,’ but due to Hilton status was upgraded to a ‘JUNIOR CORNER SUITE’ room 813 was given. Note that not all of the corner suites have airport views (811 for example). Even number rooms and 813 provided views, however, there are flats being built in front of the hotel and views from rooms 802/4/6 and possibly 808 will be restricted. Room 813 had a nice balcony, so you could sample the delights of watching the utter chaos in the streets below.
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No parking stands at the main terminal can be seen, however there is an opening to the right of the terminal, where arriving and departing aircraft can be seen if using 07R. If using 25L for arriving, then this is not a problem as the runway seems to be slightly levitated and traffic can be seen on roll-out. It seems the runways 07L/25R is primarily used as a taxiway as it was not used as an official runway during the time I was there. Further to the right of this ‘clearing,’ was the main maintenance area. Nothing can be seen or read off here unless you’re on taxy out to runway 07R and a window seat is essential. There is another hotel closer to the airport and is more towards the maintenance are called the Ethiopian Skylight Hotel. A high floored room MAY give views of the maintenance area but this was not explored. Picture below:
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Views from room Double Tree room 813:
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During my stay I didn’t use the restaurant and ordered room service instead. Selection is limited, but as an example the grilled vegetable toastie with French Fries and a slice of Tiramisu cake came to just over £5.00.
Optics and/or a very good camera are essential here. Quite a large number of Ethiopian Dash8-400s do not show on FR24 and some Ethiopian B737-800s show as US registered. This leads to a problem. On arrival into Addis Ababa and after baggage screening, Customs held me for a period of time and started questioning me about the camera equipment and telescope I was carrying. They advised me that bringing optics into Ethiopia is strictly prohibited and wanted to know the purpose behind my visit. They also wanted to know in detail about my camera and were asking if this was being fitted to a drone or will be used for aerial works. After a period of about 20-30mins and internal conversations I was allowed to go on my way.
Optics and/or a very good camera are essential here. Quite a large number of Ethiopian Dash8-400s do not show on FR24 and some Ethiopian B737-800s show as US registered. This leads to a problem. On arrival into Addis Ababa and after baggage screening, Customs held me for a period of time and started questioning me about the camera equipment and telescope I was carrying. They advised me that bringing optics into Ethiopia is strictly prohibited and wanted to know the purpose behind my visit. They also wanted to know in detail about my camera and were asking if this was being fitted to a drone or will be used for aerial works. After a period of about 20-30mins and internal conversations I was allowed to go on my way.