Upside - right on the seawall. They store your car for free while you are cruising, give you a ride to and from the dock. Everyone is very nice and friendly.

Downside - possibly the noisiest hotel we have ever stayed in. We could hear the child in the next room, the traffic out front, the band downstairs, the tv in the next room, door slamming, etc all night.
The bed was very uncomfortable. The coffee maker didn't work.

I can forgive a hotel a lot and we travel a LOT, but this one we will never return to for the above negative reasons.

Stayed for a conference. In a room with 2 queen beds. On bed was very l lumpy. I have never had lumpy bed before. For a resort, no hot tub, asked attendant, said it was by pool, but did not exist. HA Very disappointing.

As I just read in another review that I think stated it well...there was zero effort here amongst staff to react to complaints. Some of the things that I encountered on our stay...

1) The first day here, I called the front desk to ask for housekeeping to come to our room while we were both out for the day. 6 hours later I returned to the room, and no housekeeping had ever showed. I called the front desk, asked for someone to come up. An hour later and ANOTHER call to the front desk finally brought housekeeping to the room.3 calls and 7 hours seems ridicoulus.

2) My room key was de-magnitized the first day, when I took the key to the front desk no id was taken from me (scary thought). Then my husbands key didnt work when he got home- next day...SAME THING. This happened a total of 4 times during our stay of three days. It turns out that every time they were giving us a "new" key- not a copy of the old one. So at any given time only one of our keys ever worked.

3) The soda machine on our floor didnt work, I went to another floor, it took my money and didnt give me soda. Went to another machine and the soda came out hot! Took me 4 floors before I could find a working machine. During this time I saw an employee who said they'd known about the machine problems, and that "someone ought to put a sign up".

4) I called the hotel restaraunt to order lunch that I was going to pick up, and take out. They charged me a 17% gratutity charge becuase..."you called from your room."

5) The comforter on our bed had a brown stain on it from whoever was in our room before, it clearly hadnt been washed. I called and asked for a new one.

Overall- there is not enough staff to take care of patrons. Case and point, I spent a half hour on Thursday trying to call the front desk or guest relations.....all calls went to answering service! And we came in the off season, good luck in the height of summer. Also worth mentioning, very small pool, 1/3 of it is taken up with a baby waiting pool that is a foot deep. It's also not heated, so very very cold if you plan to swim when it's not the height of summer yet.

One bright spot- we asked for a late checkout, and they were helpful in giving us that. But in truth, this branch really lets the Holiday Inn brand down. I would pay more to stay at a nearby hotel instead of this one next time.

Holiday Inn Galveston on the Beach proved to be a very good deal for those of us waiting to depart on a cruise from Galveston. The hotel was clean, the staff friendly and knowledgeable, and all the rooms have a good view of the ocean.
The best part of the services offered was the free shuttle service to local restaurants and to and from the cruise port. The free parking during our cruise was a great money saver. The drivers were friendly and drove carefully.
I personally would stay at this establishment if I was in the Galveston area.