Where to stay in Kuwait

The areas

• Kuwait City centre and Sharq - the business district, the towers, the souq and the Seif Palace. Where most hotels are.
• Salmiya - the shopping and residential district along the coast, with the Scientific Center and the malls. Livelier in the evening than the centre.
• The Arabian Gulf Road - the seafront runs the length of the city and the better hotels look at it.
• Mahboula and Fintas further south are residential and cheaper, and further from everything.

What Kuwait is and is not

• This is a business and expatriate destination rather than a tourist one, and hotels are priced and equipped accordingly - good, comfortable, and short on charm.
• Weekend rates are sometimes lower than weekday, which is the reverse of Bahrain, because the demand is corporate.
• There is no beach-resort economy. The beaches are municipal and the sea is warm to the point of being unrefreshing in summer.

Where not to book

• Jahra and Jleeb Al Shuyoukh are named by the FCDO for robbery and petty theft, and neither has anything for a visitor.

Practical

• Everything is air-conditioned and connected by car. Being "central" matters less than being near a road you will use.
• No hotel serves alcohol, because there is none in the country. Hotel bars do not exist.