Olive or Twist Lounge is a 3 star hotel on Steadmak Road in Ongata Rongai, in Greater Nairobi rather than the centre itself. The bar, restaurant, parking and front desk are on site. The deciding fact is the 12.34 km distance from Upper Hill: this only works if you have a car or a driver.
01What it is
Olive or Twist Lounge lists the practical things a car borne stay needs: free car parking, free wifi, a 24 hour front desk, housekeeping, dry cleaning, a safe, non smoking rooms, a shower, towels and a TV. There is a restaurant, bars, a smoking area, a business center and a meeting room. It is a 3 star property with 24 hour room service. The list is thin on anything beyond that: no pool, no gym, no airport shuttle, no laundry beyond dry cleaning, and a surcharge line that suggests extras sit outside the room rate.
What that adds up to is a working hotel on a ridge road, not a base for seeing Nairobi. Olive or Twist Lounge suits someone with business in Ongata Rongai or along this corridor, arriving by car, wanting food, a drink and parking under one roof. It does not suit a visitor whose days belong in the centre: 12.34 km from Upper Hill and Community, which is the nearest of the ten quarters this site covers, is a drive each way, and the street itself is safe and dull after dark, with hotel bars and a ride anywhere else.
02The supplier's photographs
0318 facilities the supplier lists
Facilities are the supplier's list, not a check made on the ground.
04Standing outside the ten quarters
These hotels are not in Upper Hill and Community, and they are not in any of the ten quarters of the centre this site covers. They sit a long way out, in the wider city, and Upper Hill and Community is only the nearest of the ten quarters to them, which is not the same as being in it. Treat the quarter as a reference point, not an address. Anything you want in the CBD means travelling in and out.
The quarter itself is the western ridge above the centre: new concrete on a ridge, built for the car and the conference room. It is not the CBD proper but the ridge immediately above it, and the place most of the CBD's office space has been moving to since the 2000s: the tallest towers in the country, the big hospitals, the aid agencies, and an expressway ramp to the airport. It is best for meetings, a quiet night close in, and a fast run to the airport, and after dark it is safe and dull: hotel bars, and a ride anywhere else. The quarter lies 1.9 km from Kenyatta Avenue at Moi Avenue, which is 24 minutes on foot in a direct line.
Read the nearest quarter, Upper Hill and Community05Booking it
Book Olive or Twist Lounge if your reason for being in Ongata Rongai is fixed and you are arriving with a car. Most rooms here can be cancelled free, and you book them through app.impt.io. Every confirmed booking removes one tonne of CO2, at no extra cost to you. Five percent of what you pay comes back as IMPT credit, out of the hotel commission rather than added to your bill.
Facts on this page come from the booking supplier's record: star class, address, photographs and facility list. Guest scores come from verified stays. Nobody from this site has stayed here; the quarter copy around it is this site's own.
06Questions
Where exactly is Olive or Twist Lounge?+
It sits on Steadmak Road in Ongata Rongai, in Greater Nairobi rather than the central business district. That puts it 14.14 km from Kenyatta Avenue at Moi Avenue, which is 177 minutes on foot in a direct line. Plan on arriving by car or with a driver, not on foot.
What facilities does Olive or Twist Lounge actually have?+
The listed facilities cover free wifi, free car parking, a 24 hour front desk, housekeeping, dry cleaning, a restaurant, bars, a smoking area, a business center, a meeting room, non smoking rooms, a safe, a shower, towels and a TV. A 3 star property with 24 hour room service and a surcharge line.
How far is it from central Nairobi?+
It is 12.34 km from Upper Hill and Community, which is the nearest of the ten quarters this site covers. That is the honest figure to plan around. Nothing in the centre is walkable from here, and the area is built for the car, so treat every trip in as a drive.
What does the guest score of 4.1 out of 5 mean?+
It is a solid, not exceptional, average from 231 reviews. Read it as a property that does the basics well for people who are already in Ongata Rongai. It says nothing about how convenient the place is for the centre, which is the question that decides most stays.
