The Grand Hotel - Akaroa — Restaurant in Banks Peninsula Community

We were given this night away as a wedding gift back in February and we were looking forward to it, It started out great as the staff were very friendly and helpful and we thought we would invite our 2 friends up to join us on the balcony for some cheese/crackers before we went downstairs for dinner, We noticed in our room the latch was broken so you couldn't lock the window and you had to lift the bathroom door up to close it when going to the toilet, (Our friend thought it was bad but we didn't really mind that as it was only for 1 night) When we went inside to get ready for dinner, I put the food in the communal fridge which was in the hallway at the top of the stairs (The lady told me when we checked in that it would be safe as its on camera) The only thing left on the desk in our room was a half a bag of onion chips Rolled up and the rinsed out glasses and chopping board we had used (But it was clean and dry), we went down stairs to the bar for dinner and was told there was up to an hour wait as they had a private function in the restaurant (I was ok with this as I understand and I work in hospo) but our meals were out in about 20 mins and both our meals were fantastic and the staff were great BUT it all went horrible when I woke up early in the morning because I felt something on me only for my husband to turn the light on and there was ants in the bed, Then when we got up we realized that the desk was covered in ants too, I also opened the balcony door to see a ton of ants on the door frame inside and out, I gathered pics and then we went to the fridge and grabbed our food out and I went down stairs to talk to someone about it and show them but there was nobody around and everything was locked up, so we just packed our car up and headed home, we told our friend who brought us the holiday and we sent him the pics too, he was gutted that our gift he brought us turned into a nightmare, we told him it was not his fault but he said he would email them the pic's and lay a complain, we were shocked to hear that when the person who gave us the gift had complained and he got told it was all our fault because we had food in our room or on our desk which was not true because the "cheese" we took was in the communal fridge in the hallway the top of the stairs all night and there was no food eaten in the room, we nibbled on the balcony! We didn't Expect anything back in return but it would have been nice if they just said sorry we will get on top of our "ant problem, But all our friend got told was that when they went into our room there was no ants at the time and they told our friend that it was "our fault" for having food in our room (Which we didn't as it was on the balcony then straight into the fridge!! he even sent them the photos we took of the ants, I Have made it clear that I would NEVER recommend this accommodation, but the bar staff and food are pretty good, I hope that someone goes and investigates, because they don't feel they...

This place is anything BUT Grand! As a kiwi couple we've got a realistic view on what your local pub/tavern should be like. Some are rough around the edges but generally it's quite a welcoming affair with quality comfort food. The staff in this place were the epitome of rude. When ordering our meals we got 1x pie and chips and 1x roast of the day, which was pork. Now generally I thought asking If the roast pork came with crackling would be a reasonable and well received question to be asked, apparently not. I was met with the reply "well obviously". Ten minutes later we received our meal and low and behold... NO CRACKLING! Anyways, I got over that but we were still waiting on salt, pepper and tomato sauce. I got back up and headed over to the bar to ask for the condiments, which one would expect, and this grumpy old bugger fired me the salt shaker and went back to serving drinks. At this point I was starting to get pissed off so asked again for the remaining condiments. "No pepper" he said and flung me one of those 50c sachets of tomato sauce. Standing my ground, I asked for a bottle not a sachet and he replies over his shoulder "No" and went back to serving the other punters. He was the worst out of a bad bunch of people and if I could give this place negative one star i'd be happy to do so. Highly NOT...

What a great improvement this pub has made. We came a couple of years ago and thought to never return but the newly renovated outdoor area caught our eye recently and this weekend the live music was the thing that got us back. We have been two nights in a row and will definitely be back.

We love: live outdoor music great vibe and atmosphere friendly waitstaff fast service tables cleared even when it’s pumping multiple bars broad selection of drinks wide menu to make everyone happy awesome kids outdoor area away from the main pub crowd excellent fries kindness of kitchen for catering to us for small changes (e.g. first night the kids didn’t like the crab in the fisherman’s basket and they happily swapped it out the next night)

Even better if: the plastic glasses weren’t there, even straight from the can is better the food was all fine for pubfood, but the some of the flavours advertised (eg bbq) overpowered a few of the dishes, where as other flavours (like spicy) were lacking. Typical of many similar places but tweaking could make it next level.

We had baos, fisherman’s basket, hot chips, fried chicken, nachoes with pulled pork & spicy chicken burger over our visits and we’d happily have them again. The nachos were excellent. Love the necron on tap and the...