We hadn't been to the Alpena, MI area before and didn't know what to expect. Our stay was really terrific! The front desk staff is top notch (our thanks to Dan A.) We booked the "river view" room and it was clean, with new furniture and a comfy King bed. The view really isn't entirely of the river, but it's still overall a nice room. The breakfast buffet is fine; my preference is for the scrambled eggs instead of the packaged omelette style eggs. The choices will vary from day to day. Biscuits were made fresh and tasted good. It's basic, but well maintained and attended, which I appreciated. The walk-in shower is spacious, but it needs some sort of traction pads on the floors, which are very slippery and potentially dangerous. I did like the shampoo, conditioner and hand soap all offered in pump-style containers. Better than the tiny guest bottles (probably a new trend in the hotel industry to reduce plastic use and cut down on people hoarding the small travel size bottles.)
Heat and A/C unit was outstanding, which is often rare in a hotel. We could adjust our room temp as much as we wanted and it wasn't at all noisy.

Great location. Fast Wi-Fi. Friendly and helpful front desk staff. Large clean room with a view of the river (not all rooms have the river view). Comfortable bed and plenty of good quality pillows. Keurig, frig, and microwave in the room. Only down side was breakfast! None of the yummy cinnamon rolls HIE is known for (one of the reasons I go to HIE to be honest). I was told by another guest they were out. I went to plan B and tried to use the pancake machine to make pancakes. It malfunctioned and there was no breakfast attendant to help out. My husband wanted oatmeal, but the oatmeal pot was empty and clean-looking as if it had never even been made. We both ended up eating a bowl of cereal. As we were leaving the breakfast area, the attendant showed up. Confirmed they had been out of cinnamon rolls since the day before and asked me if I wanted to grab one end of the pancake machine and he would grab the other and we could throw it in the river. 😱 I brought the breakfast “irregularities” to the attention of the front desk staff. She apologized and immediately took $20 off my bill which I appreciated. She tried as best she could to make the situation right. That is what a business should do!