Grantham Arms — Restaurant in England

We stayed at the Grantham Arms for 2 night recently. We were in a courtyard cottage which was lovely and quirky, although not really to our taste as it was rather dark. Also it provided little privacy with the curtains opens, mainly due to some of the staff having their breaks just outside the courtyard gate. None of the roman blinds in the cottage worked properly and the two in the entrance remained permanently down, hence it was extremely dark in there. The manager informed us that the blinds were only show blinds, or words to that effect.||The public areas of the hotel were really nice, with an "old worldy" feel to them, and on both nights we had evening meals and they were exceptionally good. ||Unfortunately our stay was marred by our room not being serviced after the first night, and the manager insinuating that it was my fault because I shouldn't have put the "do not disturb" sign on the front door whilst I visited our loo, even though it was just for a few minutes (1 pm). We were out all day 9 am to 5:30 pm except for this. I asked him what I should have done differently and he said I should NOT have used the sign as the cleaner would have knocked anyway. |I suggested that the cleaners should be told to come back a second time, before abandoning the room servicing. He disagreed and said the message on the sign is very clear and the policy is displayed in the room. His message to me was uncontradictory - the sign must ONLY be used to signify you don’t want your room serviced that day, no other reason will be accepted. Presumably this prohibits temporary usage whilst going for breakfast.||Coincidently at 1:05 pm (the sign was out) the manager called at our room to see me. Why didn't he tell me that the presence of the sign meant I'd forfeited the right to have our room serviced. Afterall, he knew I'd only called in to go to the loo ! ||On the plus side, the lady who ran the bar (and very efficiently) was lovely and immediately provided us with clean towels, coffee etc. And also the manager discounted our bill because I was aggrieved about his interpretation of the "do not...

So we had an overnight stay when visiting family in the area and it was fabulous. Let’s get the niggles out of the way first. We booked via the website, it offered a choice of check-in time so we opted for 12pm so we could then spend the rest of the day with family. When we arrived we were told that the only check in time was 3pm. However, the guy behind the bar was really understanding when I showed him the booking confirmation and a room was available. He escorted us to the room giving us a guided tour on the way and even carried my bag for me. We booked because we were dining there with family in the evening. There was a bit of a hiccup with the order not being put through to the kitchen but after a very full and heartfelt apology and a complimentary round of drinks all was good. Now onto the reason for 5 stars. The rooms are lovely, very nicely decorated and furnished. A pod coffee machine rather than just a few sachets of instant coffee is a lovely touch. The bathroom is just fabulous with a bath that is so deep that I really wish I’d had time to try it out. The food, despite the hiccup was absolutely beautiful and all the staff were attentive, helpful and friendly. Would definitely...

We had a fabulous stay and the staff are amazing especially the lovely girl with the duck earrings very friendly and chatty. Atmosphere was very relaxed and welcoming and it only took an hour to decide we wanted to return. Restaurant food was superb ....the pub has an excellent waiting team ...thank you. One blip which wasn't handled well ......we booked a suite for my birthday but my husband received a call the day before to say they had to move us to a standard room due to a plumbing issue and they would give us £70 credit in the restaurant for the inconvenience. When we arrived we noticed a wedding party and we thought they had given our suite to the wedding party. We did ask to see the suite before we left as we wanted to see what we had missed. We were told "they hadn't checked out yet" ! We said we had been told there was a plumbing issue and this was the reason we couldn't stay in that room. The young girl looked a little confused and said she had forgot and it was habit saying they hadn't checked out but we still couldn't see the room as she didn't have a key! Very disappointing .....if asked we would have kindly given up the suite to the wedding guest! Even so we...