Halstead Farm — Hotel in Sundays River Valley Local Municipality

We stayed in late Feb. Unfortunately we experienced an armed invasion of our room during which two men broke through our doors, attacked one of us, and stole all of our valuables and passports. I would like to say this was just an unavoidable incident, but I don't think that's true. There were a variety of factors on the part of this guesthouse that made this incident more likely. Firstly, the property was mostly vacant and we could only contact the staff via offsite owners/relatives of owners. When we arrived at 6:30 pm, the whole property looked quite dark and empty. We buzzed at the gate and honked the horn but nobody came. We realised that they had a policy of advance notice if you were checking in after 5 pm, but this still seemed odd. We do finally contacted someone offsite who called someone to let us in. He had a friendly dog which put us at ease. However, this person did not seem to expect guests that evening and he told us we were the only guests. We did not get a full tour of the property or contact information for the staff.||||Secondly, the property was not that secure. I almost hate to put this online but I think prospective guests need to know and management needs to publicly improve these things. The gate was easy to climb and I didn't see any cameras. There was no landline phone available. Lighting was poor. The doors were easy to break through. There was supposedly a security guard but we weren't introduced and there was no security response to the loud scuffle and shouting that occurred during the break-in. There was no response from anyone, in fact. We were seemingly all alone on that property except for thieves who somehow knew to find us there. We thought we saw the security guard once when we arrived back at the hotel after dinner,but that was it and we weren't even sure if was him.||||Finally, and perhaps most critically, we learned from the police that an identical incident had happened in the same guesthouse one week prior to our stay. We were not warned of this. Security did not appear to be enhanced despite a recent break-in with guests inside. ||The staff were kind the next morning || but I think this situation could have been prevented or made better by improved management of this property. I hope...

We stayed here on 26th Feb. We were unfortunately attacked in the middle of the night by two armed thieves who stormed into our room and stole all our belongings. We then spent the rest of the night in the hotel room with no one arriving to help.

Overall, the place seemed isolated and underprepared to keep guests safe. When we first arrived at the property no one came to greet us despite honking and buzzing at the gate. We had to call the owner who then called someone in the property to greet us. Someone greeted us but didn't seem to expect us. We didn't receive a full tour of the property.

At night the main house and grounds were dark and our bedroom light was the only one on. We were the only guests there and had no idea if any of the staff were nearby.

The room had no phone and in the morning after the incident when we wanted to call the police and our embassies, the property didn't have a phone. The staff had to use their personal cell phones to call the police.

We learned from the police that a similar incident had also happened at the same property one week before but we were not informed of this by the management of the guesthouse. It did not seem that security was at all enhanced even though we were going to be staying as the only guests on a property that had recently experienced a break in.

There was very little evidence of security at the property. There was one security guard we think we saw when we returned to the farm after dinner but they didn't come to us anytime in the night despite us making a lot of noise during the break in. This place is not safe.

The staff were very kind the morning after but they seem to be woefully under supported to run a well-attended guesthouse. I hope security is fixed at this place for the sake of guests and staff. We suffered some minor injuries but it could...

GUT: Das Frühstück war frisch zubereitet und lecker. Die Anlage war relativ gepflegt. Wir sind um 17:45 Uhr angereist, da wir leider überlesen haben, dass Check In nur bis 17:00 Uhr möglich ist, somit hat uns leider niemand das Tor geöffnet. Unter der angegebenen Nummer haben wir aber direkt jemanden telefonisch erreicht und haben dann auch nur 5 Minuten gewartet, bis uns dann schließlich jemand das Tor geöffnet hat.||||SCHLECHT: Wir haben 2 Nächte in der Halstead Farm gebucht, sind aber nach einer Nacht wieder abgereist. Wir hatten ein Zimmer in dem alten Herrenhaus. Beim Betreten hat es uns schon direkt umgehauen, da das Zimmer sehr nach altem, modrigen Holz gerochen hat. Die Dame, die uns empfangen hat, hat auch direkt das Fenster geöffnet, dass wir auch bis spät Abends offen gelassen haben, leider hat dies rein gar nichts geholfen. Wir sind wirklich nicht zimperlich, aber die Geruch war wirklich sehr unangenehm. Wir wollten schlafen gehen, die Fenster blieben offen (wegen dem Geruch und es war auch extrem heiß im Zimmer). Obwohl das Licht nie an war, als das Fenster offen war, hatten wir über Nacht Besuch von ca. 500 Mücken, fliegenden Kakerlaken und einer Fledermaus im Zimmer. Zum Glück gab es ein Moskitonetz über dem Bett, trotzdem waren auch einige Mücken unter dem Netz und es war schrecklich am Morgen durch das Zimmer zu gehen, da wirklich alles voller Mücken war!!!! Mir ist klar, dass diese Tiere auf der Farm zu finden sind, aber das Problem könnte ganz einfach mit Fliegengittern gelöst werden!!! Das Bad ist sehr geräumig, die Dusche neu - diese besteht aber nur aus einer Glaswand, das heißt, dass das Wasser rechts und links beim Duschen herausläuft - nicht sehr praktisch bei einem alten Holzboden und sicher nicht förderlich für den eh schon modrigen Geruch. Die Zimmertüre hat sich nicht wirklich zusperren lassen, das heißt, diese war den ganzen Tag offen, während unseres Aufenthaltes im Addo. ||Vielleicht sind die anderen Zimmer (in den Stallungen) schöner, aber wir hätten auf keinen Fall eine weitere Nacht in der Halstead Farm verbringen wollen und würden diese auch nicht...