Black Lion Hotel — Restaurant in England

Friendly and helpful staff, however the health & safety and customer service fell far short of what should have been provided. I emailed the hotel 5 days ago and not had a response. Booking.com are now taking the case up.

1. After dinner on Friday 1 April I spoke to the lady who had checked us in (working behind the bar that night) and told her where we had left our car (I mentioned it was “abandoned” in a parking space in the market square, and that we were concerned about the signs saying the market would take place the next day). The lady assured me it was safe to park there and gave me a parking card, circulated throughout Yorkshire, she set it to show “8pm”, told me to place it on the dashboard and said we could park there until 10am on Saturday 2 April. By 9:15am on the Saturday we had a parking ticket for £35.

2. the room, while quaint, had windows in the bedroom and bathroom with windowsills at shin height, single glazing with just a screw lock to hold them shut. While we were bringing bags into the room my 7 year old immediately undid the lock in the bathroom, opened it wide and hung his head out over the cobbles below from 3-4 floors up, nothing to prevent him falling out. The bedroom window was the same, obviously we warned the children against going near the windows. No child locks in a family room?

3. the room had a skylight window over my child’s bed with no blind. I used a travel blackout blind but as I pressed this onto the glass the window and it’s frame moved. I didn’t test it further but I doubt the window is secure.

4. the tap in the bathroom sink was dripping hot water when we arrived (not a problem) indicating there was plenty of hot water. By 8am the next morning there was no hot water at all in either shower or sink. As there was no phone to call staff, my husband braved the cold shower. I’d had a terrible nights sleep (just noise from folk leaving pubs on the street outside) and couldn’t face the cold water so boiled a kettle to fill the sink, but the plug was not the right size and the sink emptied within 3-4 mins.

5. not as serious but the quality of the kids meal on the Friday night was pretty poor - margarita pizza was a semi circle of hard baked biscuity base with lots of oily melted cheddar cheese on top. I’m guessing this is pre-packed industrially produced. It would cost the hotel pennies to make the dough themselves and use tomato passata and mozzarella.

6. there was a bad smell of sewage from the toilet in the morning.

7. at breakfast the service seemed a bit patchy and slow (cooked breakfast took about 25-30 mins to arrive) and we didn’t feel we could bring up the cold water or window safety issues. Waitress, Tara, took our payment for the previous nights dinner, it would have been good at that point if she had checked everything had been satisfactory.

I complained about the parking ticket and the hot water to Tara on the Saturday after breakfast who took notes quickly and promised to pass it on, no...

Lovely food and ambience. If there's a group of you, book the snug, which is lovely and cosy. Shame the fireplace is only for looking at, but the whole place is nicely furnished and decorated. Staff are attentive without being intrusive. I recommend the rump steak toastie, which was perfectly cooked. I would've preferred a toasted baguette or panini to sliced white, but it was nice and came with good chips.

The hotel is a great location for Richmond, right in the town centre but not noisy, as the rooms are at the back. Our room was nicely decorated with solid wood furniture - Free-standing wardrobe, dressing table and bedside cabinets. Surfaces are not flat because the floor slopes, but that's more entertaining than inconvenient, a quirk of such an old building. The only furniture I would add is an easy chair or two, especially as we arrived after a very hard-working day, and the pub seating is all dining-style. The sleigh bed was comfy, with good pillows and you could choose a bright central light or softer side lights. The brew station was well-equipped; I don't like UHT milk, but they gave me a jug of the real stuff, which lasted through to the morning when I kept it on the windowsill. Some rooms have a bath with over-shower and some just a shower. Ours was the former, which can feel a little cooler, but the water was very hot, so I can't complain. We stayed in the middle of December and the radiator in our room wasn't working. However once we reported it, the staff arrived with a portable heater in about 30 seconds! It worked perfectly and having switched it off overnight, we were warm enough in the morning...

Room was very small (room 4) tucked up at the top of the pub and looked nothing like any photos on the website. The facilities were poor. The carpet was grubby and looked unhoovered. The paintwork was dirty and chipped. The shower cubicle was so small once in you couldn't turn round let alone bend down to pick up the shower gel! Water pressure was hit and miss. The hot water came hotter than a boiling kettle, the radiator in the bathroom prevented us sitting on the toilet properly - you had to sideways on. The radiator in the bedroom came apart and there was no heating on at all. The room was freezing. The windows were running with condensation as there was no extractor fan in the bathroom. And a strange fishy smell throughout our stay? Breakfast wasn't of a good quality, items missing on 1st day - no black pudding, cold toast, undercooked bacon (raw fat) and 2nd day I just asked for poached eggs on toast but the toast was that soggy from the egg water that I left it. The coffee was nice! The minute we entered the pub we were asked for payment upfront and had to pay for drinks and food as we went - found this strange that we couldn't put it on the room and pay on departure? The room was not serviced at all. Would have been nice to get a new towel as there was no heating and they stayed damp for 4 days. I do...