Hotel Lake Brunner — Restaurant in South Island

Checking into hotel, staff were confused with the booking, asked me to sign in but had a different name on sheet, I said this was wrong. Gave me blank form to sign and then he said he would fill in the remainder later. He apologised and asked if we were having dinner in the hotel as it was busy and we might miss out. 10 minutes after bringing in bags, settling into room and confirming dinner reservation, there was a knock at the door, same staff came back to advise that we were given the wrong room. Gave us key and directions. We had to pack car and drive to the back of hotel, directions were not correct and had to go ask another staff member. Still details given were not clear. Finally found room myself after wandering around.

Went to dinner for 6:30pm reservation. After waiting about 45 mins from when we ordered food, staff member came back questioning if we had reserved the table....? She left and then came back and mentioned that they were offering a complimentary bottle of wine as we had actually reserved a table. As we don't drink wine, staff said they would check with manager if they could offer a free beer or drink instead. Didn't hear anything back. Then waited another 20 minutes for food.

Food came out, burger was nice and large serving. Staff asked who had the burger and I said I did, then the other plate was put down and they didn't mention what it was. The other meal ordered was bangers and mash but we received the Mongolian beef. After such a long wait we were not going to send it back and have one meal get cold whilst the other person waited. At the same time we ordered the meal, we ordered dessert (which we also waited a long time for).

When paying the bill, we explained the mix up. The staff member apologised and said that they were busy, which they were. There was no mention of any complimentary offer as discussed before. We left disappointed.

I would seriously avoid dinner at this place if busy, as not only the service is diminished but you can not even hold a conversation due to the excessive noise.

Also when checking in, they did not mention anything about having a band playing during the night. Was kept up till the early hours of the morning by the band and pub patrons, the noise from other partying guests and the extremely noisy refrigerator and a radiator that doesn't work and no light in...

We were warmly greeted on arrival and though we were given a map and had it explained to us how to get to our room, we still found it a bit confusing to find. Bigger numbers on both the front and back of motel rooms would be helpful in this instance. A plus is that there's plenty of parking. Our unit had a great view of the lake, but upon entering, we were hit with an extremely strong perfume smell, presumably from cleaners using room spray to freshen it up. It was so overpowering and strong that it gave me a little headache and opening all the windows and doors did little to lessen the smell. The unit itself was pretty outdated and there was mould on the window frame next to our bed. The shower was very old, ridiculously tiny and had a fixed shower head, which I'm not a fan of. The meal at the hotel restaurant was nice enough and our waitress was friendly, but it was extremely busy and you could see that the staff were run off their feet. When our burgers arrived they were on plates not much bigger than the burgers themselves, which would make it very hard to use a knife and fork on (as they were too big to pick up in our hands). We had to ask for bigger plates, which was accommodated happily. The kids were given pictures to colour in, but there were literally no leads in the majority of the pencils and the felts had all run out of ink. When paying for our meal, the waitress took our eftpos payment, then left us before the transaction was complete and didn't come back - it was really weird and we ended up just walking away. Though our beds were comfortable, we had a terrible nights sleep due to the loud music and noise coming from the bar and patrons until after midnight. The walls of our unit seemed quite thin and though the people next door to us weren't overly loud, we could hear them enough for it to be disturbing. We had a pretty abrupt checkout experience with minimal words spoken from the lady at reception and barely a smile. We would not choose to stay at Hotel Lake Brunner again...

As locals we took the 30 minute drive here last night for dinner and what a waste of petrol it was! We had made a reservation for 6pm. We arrived at approx 5.45pm and were seated. We were then asked to order rapidly as they were going to be quite busy that night which was fine. We ordered our entrees and mains as well as drinks. Im the meantime a loud group were seated next to us. Entrees arrived which were average the empty plates then sat on our table for 15 minutes before we seen to again. In the meantime we couldnt even talk to each other or hear one another thanks to the loud obnoxious group who were practically yelling at one another. Mains arrived, We ordered a pizza each at $21 per pizza...A couple of toppings sparingly scattered on a tortilla which was appallingly to say the least. My partner was still eating with food still on the plate and the waitress attempted to clear our table, My partner then went to the toilet and the waitress once again tried to clear our table (Food still on plates). It was clear they were trying to get us out. My partner returned from the toilet and couldnt get back to our table easily as the same group were sitting in pathways blocking the route to our table. We then had enough and I went to pay. I approached the desk and was stared at rudely by a staff member to which I said I would lile to pay. She then accepted my payment very rudely. $84 for a Horrible atmosphere, Terrible food and Extremely disgusting service. As locals we will not be returning and will be telling our family and friends about the experience to ensure they do not waste their time and money for the same appalling experience. Worst anniversary dinner ever!! If I could give it no...