The city of Tel Aviv, Israel has some world class beaches amongst it’s sights. With a three day stay in this wonderful city, we needed a conveniently located hotel located close to may of our sights. We decided on the Sheraton Tel Aviv. Our stay at this property was just what was needed for our multi day stay, and became a convenient base of operations for our time in the city.

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This post is one chapter on our trip to Jordan, Israel and France during the end of the pandemic. This trip was enhanced through Marriott Bonvoy Elite Status, Hertz Gold Plus Rewards and Alaska Mileage Plan. For more information on how this trip was booked, please see our trip introduction here. For other parts of the trip, please see this index.

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us here or on social media through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram for more travel tips and hacks on how to “Upgrade Your Travels”.

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Review: Sheraton Tel Aviv, Israel

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“A Fully Modernized Sheraton Property, with an Excellent Location, Direct Access to Gordon Beach, An Outstanding Executive Lounge that is only Slightly Hampered by Small Rooms”

During our stay at the Sheraton Tel Aviv, we enjoyed a day tour to Jerusalem and a day nearby on Tel Aviv’s Gordon’s Beach. Please see these posts for a little more detail on activities we did from the Sheraton Tel Aviv.

Booking The Sheraton Tel Aviv:

We had a three day stay planned for a brief visit to Tel Aviv. We were passing through the region, so I thought that this might be an introductory visit that might allow us to decide if we wanted a longer trip to the city.

There were several Marriott Bonvoy properties in the region. They started with the over the top The Jaffa – a Luxury Collection Hotel, Tel Aviv, the mid grade Sheraton Tel Aviv, and the cheapest Renaissance Tel Aviv.

I ended up booking the Sheraton Tel Aviv for it’s excellent location right on the beach front. We would also have access to the Sheraton Lounge as a Marriott Bonvoy Titanium level member – a feature that MrsWT73 particularly enjoys. I also happened to notice that the Renaissance rooms were slightly more compact in foot print. The Renaissance Tel Aviv Rooms were coming in at 23sq m or 247 sq feet, whereas the Sheraton Tel Aviv rooms were a slightly more spacious 25 sq m or 269 sq feet.

I was only able to get a AAA rate of $460 USD for stay as a result of pricing pressure due to a convention taking place at the hotel over our visit. This allowed booking into a Club Seaview-Adults only with Club lounge access, Guest room, 1 Queen(s), High floor, Balcony.

Marriott Bonvoy Reward Opportunities:

The Sheraton Tel Aviv prices towards the expensive side in the Marriott Bonvoy rewards program. The property generally prices between 50,000 to 65,000 Marriott Bonvoy reward points, for a standard level room.

If you value Marriott Bonvoy Rewards points at 0.005 cents per point, you’ll likely be better off redeeming points if the room rate is more expensive than $250 USD (at 50,000 points) or $325 USD (at 65,000 points).

In our case, we preferred just to earn the points as a Marriott Bonvoy Titanium Level member. We would earn 17.5 points as a Titanium level member, and an additional 5 points per dollar spent on the American Express Marriott Bonvoy credit card, for a total of 22.5 points per dollar.

Suite Night Awards:

Marriott Suite Night Awards are for Marriott Bonvoy Platinum, Titanium or Ambassador members and can be used to upgrade to a selected room in the suite (or almost suite) category, confirming it 5 days in advance of arrival.

While we didn’t use the Suite Night Awards at this particular hotel, the hotel does offer the Sheraton Tel Aviv Junior Suite within the Suite Night Awards program. The Junior Suite wasn’t too exciting, as it faces eastward and doesn’t have a water view. As a result, it’s a little less appealing for a property that happens to be situated right on the water.

Getting to the Sheraton Tel Aviv:

We ended up arriving into Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel coming off of Royal Jordanian Crown Business Class Amman – Tel Aviv. We took a taxi from the airport to hotel, since the hotel was not conveniently located next to the airport train.

Our taxi was 140 New Israeli Shekels ($40 USD) and the travel time took about thirty five minutes. The taxi driver was particularly slow, something that was irritating MrsWT73 after a long process of getting through the Ben Gurion International Airport.

The Sheraton Tel Aviv is well located right on Gordon Beach in Tel Aviv. The hotel’s location is excellent for walking the length of the Gordon Beach promenade, and is a short five blocks from the restaurant and shopping area on Harav Reines St.

Checking into the Sheraton Tel Aviv:

As we arrived to the property, we left behind the intensive security checks from travels in Jordan and walked straight into the hotel with our bags. Much like the rest of the hotel, the lobby had been fully refreshed and featured modern colours.

After presenting ourselves at the front desk, the lobby receptionist identified that we were Marriott Bonvoy Titanium level members. She invited us to check in at the VIP Executive Lounge on the 18th floor. Not being one to pass up on a travel opportunity like this, we accepted.

We wandered over to the elevator bank. We didn’t realize at the time that the elevator bank was of the type where you had to key in your floor in advance prior to boarding the elevator. We had a moment of confusion as we navigated on and off with our luggage as we made it to the eighteenth floor.

The arrived to the Sheraton Executive Lounge at the 18th floor. The Sheraton Executive Lounge staff were ready and waiting for us on arrival. We were offered a glass of sparking wine, white wine or red wine from the nearby lounge while our check in was processed. This was a great small touch and put MrsWT73 in a great mood.

We were also offered a Marriott Bonvoy late checkout, however ,since we were departing on an early flight, we didn’t take advantage of this opportunity.

The Room: Club Seaview

Adults only with Club lounge access, Guest room, 1 Queen(s), High floor, Balcony

We self guided ourselves up to Room #1605 which was our assigned Club Sea View Suite. Like in other areas of the hotel, the hallways and rooms had been upgraded and offered new and modern furnishings.

The Bedroom:

The Club Seaview Room featured a compact 267 sq foot room. The room had been recently renovated and featured new or near new furnishings. Immediately after stepping into the room, you found yourself in the living space area with a queen size bed at your fingertips.

Being a small room, there wasn’t a lot of extra space to move around in. It reminded me of some of the compact level rooms that had experienced on the other side of the world in the Sheraton Waikiki – Honolulu, USA; which was built around the same generation as this particular hotel.

The living space was equally as compact, but it did offer a single bottle of water, along with a space to charge devices and part some extra suitcases.

The room featured a large 55 inch flat screen television. For some strange reason, on our visit, we were unable to locate the television remote control. This wasn’t a major issue since we didn’t come to Tel Aviv to spend time in the hotel room watching television. We ended up bypassing this issue by unplugging the television when we weren’t using it.

The room featured an illy coffee maker, along with to go cups.

The hotel also provided a generous Marriott Bonvoy Titanium level welcome amenity consisting of a small bottle of Israeli Golan Heights wine, along with a box of five Mt Hermon chocolates. This was a really nice touch.

The room also contained a “for charge” mini bar that contained soft drinks and beer. As we had access to the Sheraton Executive Lounge, we didn’t find ourselves needing the mini bar. However, it’s always nice to have comforting options.

Looking back towards the room entry, we had a compact storage wall unit. There was space to store one small rolling suitcase on the shelf. As a result, our larger bags ended up on the floor of the room in the living space itself.

There was a small closest with two Sheraton robes available for comfort.

The room also featured a floor plan of the property. While most of the rooms offer a water view, the floor plan does show the limited upgrade potential due to a lack of suites available at this particular Sheraton property.

Balcony:

The room also featured a small balcony. The balcony didn’t contain any chairs or other outside lounging furniture. The balcony did have a great view of Gordon Beach.

The morning views were equally as engaging. The views stretched on for miles, and it was rare to have such an unobstructed skyline view.

I would easily spend time out there each morning checking the whether and the sights from the room. The water view is among the reasons to stay at this property, so it’s well worth taking the water views during your stay.

The Bathroom:

Just off the entrance was the rooms small bathroom. This was assuredly a bathroom for one person. It contained a new stand up shower, along with a single vanity.

It was compact enough in here that we had trouble balancing both of our toiletries on the provided counter space.

The room provided a welcome card, in addition to being the last hotel that I’ve stayed. in that still operations in Make a Green Choice. Never one to give up points voluntarily, we ended up participating in “Make a Green Choice” in exchange for 500 Marriott Bonvoy points for giving up on housekeeping, per night.

The room itself was new and sparkling. It was perfectly sufficient for one traveller. However, with the two of us travelling, it got compact and tight quartered pretty quickly.

Food and Beverage:

Sheraton Executive Lounge:

Instead of accepting breakfast in the hotel restaurant, we elected to accept the extra 1,000 Marriott Bonvoy points and enjoy breakfast in the Sheraton Executive Lounge.

The Sheraton Executive Lounge Tel Aviv operates on the eighteenth floor of this hotel property. The lounge is in a large space that offers dining and couch seating options with a small open air balcony area.

There is a small outdoor balcony area just off the seated area of the lounge. I really appreciated this feature, although I didn’t get an opportunity to use it as much as I would have liked, as the seats tended to hill up quite quickly.

In addition to the primary seating, the lounge also offered seating around the back of the lounge. These seats offered no view, so they tended to only fill up when the lounge was near capacity.

Consistent with a great international Sheraton Executive Club, the lounge featured a full bar and sprit service. These included Israeli wines, and the usual international vodka and gin spirits.

The lounge featured a substantial amount of food and snack and supper time. These included a number of middle eastern salads, cold meat items along with a reasonable number of hot items like grilled aubergines and middle eastern casseroles.

The Sheraton Executive Lounge featured some solid views of the nearby Renaissance Tel Aviv. It’s not hard to have a bright outlook to the start of your day, when you wake up to morning views like this.

We were pretty happy with the Sheraton Executive Lounge. Having access to a great lounge can easily make the stay that much more comfortable. MrsWT73, a value seeker, was often frequently stopping by the lounge for a snack or a sip and the Sheraton Tel Aviv’s Executive Lounge was a very comfortable place to stay.

Lobby Lounge Bar:

The Sheraton Tel Aviv offered a lobby lounge bar. The Lobby Lounge Bar offered a place to get a coffee or otherwise stock up on drinks. Since we hd access to the wonderful Sheraton Executive Lounge, we didn’t get the opportunity to enjoy the Lobby Lounge Bar.

Manara Restaurant:

The hotels’ on property restaurant was the Manara Restaurant. The Manara Restaurant served local Israeli cuisine. The hotel recommended reservations at this particular location as the restaurant tended to get popular with locals.

While we didn’t get the opportunity to test out the hotels food and beverage options outside of the Sheraton Executive Lounge, it’s worth nothing that these outlets seemed to be exceptionally popular. There frequently appeared to be lines and people visiting the restaurants, which I interpret to be a good thing.

Around the Hotel Property:

Outdoor Pool:

The Sheraton Tel Aviv is a full service hotel. Along with ever feature and amenity, it has access to an outdoor pool and sun deck for it guests.

Unfortunately, based on the orientation of the building, with the pool deck located on the north side of the building, the pool deck remained in shade for most of the day with the sun blocked by the tower part of the Sheraton Tel Aviv.

The pool deck featured day time dining at Deck 115; a restaurant and bar.

The pool deck featured a substantial amount of seating. Most of this seating was in the shade during our visit.

The pool deck offered a small hot tub. The pool deck had views of the Gordon Beach from it’s deck.

The pool itself had portions that were in the sun, although the seating around the pool in the sunny spots were, at times, limited.

Aside from having great views of Gordon Beach, the pool area didn’t have any unique or distinctive features to it, We didn’t have an infiniti pool view of the Mediterranean or any other features like that.

Exercise Room:

The Sheraton Tel Aviv offered a small exercise room near the pool deck. The exercise room was stuffed full of equipment. It was a bit of a strange thing to have just an exercise room when the wonderful Tel Aviv beach walkway was just outside.

Gordon Beach Access:

The Sheraton Tel Aviv offers direct access to Gordon Beach. By descending from the lobby two level (through the hotels’ convention space) you’ll find yourself accessing the walkway to Gordon’s Beach.

The hotel also offered a towel service near the beach access. Guests had the ability to sign for towels to take to the beach.

The Sheraton Tel Aviv is located a short walk across and shortly down the street for public beach access. We spent the better part of the day at Gordon Beach.

The Sheraton Tel Aviv’s location close to Gordon’s Beach was super convenient. In addition to being close to the Gordon’s Beach, it was also easy to access the waterfront promenade for a comfortable walk.

Checking Out of the Sheraton Tel Aviv:

Our check out was without any issues. Our points posted accurately and within three days of departing the property. We didn’t have to chase for our Make a Green Choice points, which appeared as a separate line item on our Marriott Bonvoy account.

We took a Blacklane Car to the Ben Gurion International Airport in order to board our Turkish Airlines Business Class Tel Aviv – Istanbul flight, connecting onwards to Turkish Airlines Business Class Istanbul – Paris flight back home.

I really enjoyed the Sheraton Tel Aviv and would look forward to returning to this property some time in the future.

Bottom Line: The Sheraton Tel Aviv

The Sheraton Tel Aviv met all the expectations for a city based Sheraton. While it wasn’t to the full calibre of a Sheraton esort property, it met all the requirements for a comfortable stay.

The Sheraton Executive Lounge was particularly comfortable and a highlight of this particular stay. In addition, the access to Gordon Beach can’t be beat.

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If you have stayed at the Sheraton Tel Aviv, did the small rooms inconvenience you in any way?

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