Stanstead Airport Hotels With Airport Views

It’s a rare and specific pleasure to sit in a fancy hotel restaurant at twilight and watch the planes arrive and depart from the airfield. As I’m sure Alain de Botton has probably pointed out, there’s something otherworldly about stopping to enjoy the ambience of a place intended solely for transit. Mixed with that glamour may be some variation of schadenfreude, in knowing that each plane is full of stressed people about to spend a night on the airport floor while you enjoy your rare steak. If you can relate to these feelings at all, there are two Stansted Airport hotels that offer airport views. If you have an interest in plane spotting or just enjoy watching the aircraft coming and going, these are the best places to book a room. Both of the hotels are 4 star properties close to the terminal building, so they are not the cheapest options for an overnight stay at Stansted. However, they are the only ones offering airport views. We’ve put together a guide to what to expect and what else the hotels have to offer.

Hilton London Stansted Airport

The bedrooms on the top (third) floor offer the best views over the runway. The rooms facing the airport will allow you to see planes departing on runway 23. You can’t take pictures from the hotel, but photographs are possible from the runway 05 threshold. You can walk there from this hotel; it’s about half a mile away. There is a shuttle bus to the terminal building.

The guest rooms have satellite TV and video games consoles. Some have access

to wireless internet, which is also available in foyer. The hotel is close to both the impressive Imperial War Museum at Duxford and the stately Audley End House: a beautiful National Trust property. There’s a swimming pool with a sauna and a sizeable Jacuzzi, and a well-equipped fitness centre. The business centre is your own little office away from home, and some combination of these elements should relax any stressed-out businesspeople.

Radisson SAS Hotel London Stansted Airport

Again, the high level bedrooms offer the best views, although photographs aren’t possible. These rooms allow you to see over one of the Ryanair satellite terminals. The hotel is in a great location, a short walk to the terminal. From there you can get limited views of the runways, with every aircraft taxiing past at some point.

The guest rooms are air conditioned and soundproofed. They have cable TV and free wireless internet access. This is a modern hotel with extensive leisure facilities including a gym, small pool, sauna and spa. The business facilities are atypical in that they don’t look like they’ve been left over from the 1970s, and the rooms are unusually stylish as well, with sleek black and red furnishings, and floral prints nowhere to be seen. The hotel has four restaurants, covering Italian, Spanish and New York Grill. Most impressive is the inexplicably fancy Angel’s Wine Tower Bar, which boasts Europe’s first wine tower, a huge glowing pillar housing over 4000 bottles and manned by a beautiful woman in a flying harness. Not quite what you’d expect from a relatively minor airport hotel, but well worth checking out.