Golden Lily Guest House
No. 5&47; 88, Natsin Road, Southern Shan State, Kalaw, Kalaw, Myanmar, 11221 - See map
Get your trip off to a great start with a stay at this property, which offers free Wi-Fi in all rooms. Conveniently situated in the Kalaw part of Kalaw, this property puts you close to attractions and interesting dining options. As an added bonus, restaurant is provided on-site to conveniently serve your needs.
Highlights
Facilities
Airport transfer
Bicycle rental
Pets allowed
Car park
Free Wi-Fi in all rooms!
Front desk [24-hour]
BBQ facilities
Luggage storage
Don't trust the bad comments, try for yourself! :)”
We read very bad things about this guesthouse but we decided to give it a try because it was the cheapest in Kalaw we could find and most of the bad comments were already from 2016 and oh boy, I guess a lot has changed since then! This was the nicest place we stayed in, in whole Myanmar. Definitely not when you are into clean, modern hostels with spotless bathrooms and big rooms but we stayed in a (very) small cozy room with wooden walls and a lot of light. The breakfast was amazing and we always had leftover for lunch, the staff was very friendly and helpfull with everything! The location is also perfect. The hot shower worked and the bathrooms were not very pleasant to the eye but always clean! Honestly, I could not say a bad thing about this guesthouse. We felt at home！
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Golden Lily Out performs her one star rating”
The stay at Golden Lily has been excatly what can be positively expected.. Good service, Great Trekking guides and They out class their one star rating with service they offer... Real value for money..
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Good place to start a trek”
I stayed two nights, one with a shared bathroom and one with a private bath. Shared baths are decent, but it was worth the extra money to have the private bathroom. Hot showers in both. The rooms are not heated, and it gets very cold in Kalaw after the sun goes down! Bring a long sleeved shirt. The staff is very friendly, and arranged treks for many of us. I took a one day trek which was really great, the guides were excellent. funny, energetic, spoke good english, and had a lot to point out along the way. The wifi here is incredibly spotty, I was connected for about 15 minutes out of 2.5 days. just assume you will not have internet access.
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Very good for a backpacker”
Robin and Lily were very friendly, honest and kind with us. The room was good, breakfast was good, but the toilet very dirty. The best sightseeing from Kalaw to Inle Lake, because it's not so touristic. I strongly reccomend it!!!
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Cheap room, excellent trekking service”
The guest house itself isn't high quality but the price reflects this, you get what you pay for! The staff and breakfast are lovely and the trekking organised by them was superb and great value for money.
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Nice owner but ice cold water”
Very short stay before 3-days trekking. The owner was excellent guide. Very good location with nice Kalaw view. The room was climatic, but the water was a real problem. In the night there was no water at all, in the morning there was a water but ice clod - awfull thing in such a cold climate! The room wasn't clean
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unhelpful staff, old structure, overpriced”
I stayed only one night before trekking and after I moved to another hotel nextdoor. The room was clean and the bathroom kind of (the ceiling looked like it was bot cleaned since ages), butit definitely needs maintenance and renovations (there is no sink pipe, so everytime you wash your hands you get a feet shower). The staff was rather careless of your presence and not very helpful with questions and infos. I think Lily's GH is going on just thanks to the fact that it's in all guide books, but I would rather spend those 2$ more and stay in other much better places in kalaw.
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Basic but adequate ”
It was OK. Very basic and not enough bedding given how cold it can be in Kalaw at night. shower was inadequate. Breakfast was basic but adequate.
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My worst experience after 4 years traveling”
I have been continuesly traveling for 4 years and my girlfriend for 3 years. This is my first bad review in all these years. We had a very disappointing experience with the Golden Lily Guesthouse. You would think it is the cheapest in town so you can expect you get barely anything. But it is not even the cheapest in town. Just the best known cheapest in town. We were right about barely getting anything though. We arrived in the middle of the night with the bus. We booked a room because we like to jump into a bed immediatly to still get some sleep. So we booked in advance and also paid. But when we arrived in the guesthouse they told us there was no room for us. We explained that we booked, but it did not matter. No room is no room. They put us on a matras on the floor, next to the garbage, were they usually put people that don't have a booking and told us we could stay untill twelve and then we had to leave. The next morning the owner asked us if we wanted to stay another night. I was almost sure she wanted to make it up with us after we hardly slept because the matras was next to the kitchen too, were the staff started working early. To be sure I just asked if we needed to pay for that. Her answer was if we wanted to book or not! When I looked at her with a face written allover "What do you want from me?", she finally replied, ofcourse you have to pay. I explained the situation again ,but it didn't matter. So I politely refused. We could stay untill twelve so had the chance to test the promised hot showers and the wifi. No hot showers were available and talking with other guest appareantly we were lucky that there was water at all. The wifi barely worked. So our stay in this guesthouse basically resulted in a very expensive breakfast. When we walked around after this small disaster we found the Mya Sabai Inn on the main road with rooms for 7 dollars per person. Nothing special, but a lot cleaner than Lily guesthouse. And another guesthouse a little further was
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If only the family had been welcoming”
When I arrived the family member standing at reception was neither welcoming nor friendly, so much so that the taxi driver didn't want to leave me. My room was on the first floor. Throughout the afternoon there was no water for the 2 toilets & showers (shared by about 10 rooms) & when I asked about when there would be water, there was no apology, a member of the family just said it was the fault of the government that there wasn't electricity (to operate the pump). My room had the advertised "garden view" (a few flowers & the washing drying) but it also was above the kitchen area, where people started to prepare food at 5am (not for the tourists' breakfast, so presumably for the owner family) which woke me. The tourists' breakfast was the worst I'd had in 3 weeks in Myanmar; "Coffee Mix" - a packet of instant coffee, "creamer" & sugar - & 2 (cold) pancakes, one with a jam filling, the other with some banana - no choice. The hotel advertised access to wifi only from 17.00 to 21.00. In that time I was unable to use the internet because the demand was so high. The owner family knew about this because they suggested I try after 20.00 "when fewer people would be trying to use it". I could've overlooked any of the negative experiences if the owner family had been in the slightest bit friendly & welcoming but they weren't, so this was the worst place that I stayed at in 4 weeks of traveling in Myanmar.
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A spacious room ”
The double rooms are spacious and have a nice terrace where you can chill and have a great view. The walls between the rooms are very thin, so if you happen to have a loud neighbour, you might not sleep much. The staff was numerous, it seems to be a large family, and some of them are quite friendly.
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For 1 night ”
If you wanna do the trekking and just sleep one night on a budget, this place is fine. But the budget-look is pretty obvious. The owners were very nice, they do not offer the cheapest tours (actually quite expensive, but they take a different route than the mainstream tours), so we booked one somewhere else. The breakfast was also good. The bathroom was pretty primitive and the beds were so thin on a wooden plate which was terrible. But the main problem we had was that is was so cold! There is no heat anywhere and it got 9 degrees outside and inside. We had windows but there were cracks everywhere and we could feel wind coming in. The WiFi did not work at all, haven’t been able to use it. I would still recommend to backpackers since it’s so cheap, and you only sleep there one night.
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Decided to leave the hostel”
Dirty rooms and facilities, The owner is a rude old lady that only see tourists as walking dollars. It is the cheapest option in Kalaw so she doen't care about treating the guests right. We decided to leave the hostel, Golden Kalaw In is only a few steps away and the rooms are way nicer and the staff friendly.
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okay for the very low price”
It's okay if budget is important for you. There are only 2 toilets with shower for all the rooms without shower so get up early! Very small breakfast but included in the low price.
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Low cost for backpackers”
Hotel is walking distance from the bus station. Rooms are basic, more or less clean. Breakfast is ok - you get the pancake with bananas, tea, coffe and some fruits. Really good value for money - this was the cheapest hotel we stayed in Burma.
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You get what you pay for”
The beds were comfortable and clean, the bathrooms had hot water and the breakfast is good. It's a bit grotty and there's only 2 toilets that don't really work but it's what I expected for the price.
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I had a good time at Lily Guesthouse,”
I could allready go into the room when I arrived in the middle of the night, even when I had booked for one night. I met my amazing guide Robin here, you should go on a trekking with him!!
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rude staff, gross hostel, no wifi”
obviously, this was the cheapest guest house we could find, so we were a little apprehensive to begin with. we read some other reviews, but thought, "how bad could it be?" the toilets were cracked and disgusting, our room was questionable, and we didn't have windows. the lady at the front desk (robin's sister apparently?) was nice when we first checked in, and incredibly rude every interaction we had with her afterwards. the best thing about this place was the trek to inle lake we booked through robin.
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Unfriendly, dirty, don't book!”
After having read the bad review I've thought that some people are mean and I booked anyway. But they were right! This place was terrible. The lady at reception was mean to me, unfriendly and impolite with no reason. The place is falling apart and the bathroom are in terrible conditions. The toilet was stuck for with stool footing and cold water. Not the best condition before my trekking. The room was basic, with a big hole in the wall, but in the morning you can ear all noises from the breakfast room. They lied to me when I asked if the trekking company Jungle King was theirs. I didn't want to give my money to someone that treat me like a stupid. I know the place is cheap, but you do better finding someone in the bus when you get to Kalaw and share a room in one of the hotel in town and ask them to bring the price down (if you can't afford it). They will do it. This was my worst experience in Myanmar. Too bad I can't post pictures for proof.
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Basic, but good enough”
It's not stellar, but you get what you pay for. The Internet is only turned on for 4hrs each day, and when we were there they ran out of water (or turned it off?) at 9pm so we couldn't take showers. The rooms are very basic, but for just one night it was fine.
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