The building is impressive, and the communal areas are well-decorated and “grand”, especially the main staircase. However, our room was not so grand. It is unfortunately in dire need of refurbishment. We were greeted by the musty smell of old furnishings, and the room was poorly laid out (I kept hitting my head on the sloped roof because of the position of the bed). For a double room, it’s quite odd that there was only one bedside table, and the power sockets were too far from the bed to be useful. Our room really should have been a storage cupboard.
Our main problem was that the staff did not appear to know what was going on. We called the hotel to let them know we’d be arriving late, and they cheerfully gave us entirely wrong information about what we’d need to do to gain access to arrival. When we’d spent some time sorting that out, we were told at reception that the bar closed at midnight. So, we went upstairs and unpacked, then came down at 11.15pm to be told by the bar staff that they had already closed. We checked the guest information book, and the bar should indeed have been open until midnight on a Thursday. The breakfast was okay, if a bit limited in choice, and the odd layout meant that guests kept having to squeeze between other guests’ tables to get to their seat. Also, breakfast patrons were not allowed to sit in the best part of the room, overlooking the park, for some reason. A bit of an odd stat, but we did sleep well in the end, despite the lack of AC.