Hotels in Cornwall.

The Fieldhead Hotel, West Looe.

I am writing this review in the interest of helping others avoid the bad experience we had.

We got married on the 29^th June so we were looking for a good quality hotel for a couple of nights for a mini honeymoon. The Fieldhead had vacancies when most other hotels were fully booked. The pictures on the hotels' website looked good and it had positive statements from previous guests, although both of these are controlled by the hotel's management so are not reliable.

My initial impression of the hotel was that it was claustrophobic and stuffy. The room was cramped and full of spiders. It was difficult for 2 people to move around easily due to the lack of space and the bathroom was small, dingy, old fashioned and poorly equipped. The general feel of the room was of a downmarket guesthouse that hadn't been redecorated for several decades. I've stayed in B&Bs costing £25 – 30 per night that were better than this.

The food was truly awful. Two days in a row we were served a full English breakfast that was undercooked and greasy and consisted of poor quality ingredients.. My wife ordered scrambled eggs with smoked salmon and was presented with a small mound of rubbery egg with a couple of strips of limp, bony, fishy smelling salmon draped across the top, all swimming in a pool of oil. It looked and smelt disgusting and was inedible. On the sideboard was a bowl of fruit. The oranges were hard and dried up, the bananas overripe and the solitary nectarine that I picked up was rotten on the underside. After checking out we were so hungry that we stopped at the Little Chef by the Tamar bridge. Now, Little Chefs are the butt of many jokes but the food and service were far superior to the Fieldhead.

The manager of the hotel appeared to be pleasant and friendly but scratch the surface and underneath a very intolerant, patronising Basil Fawlty-esque character is revealed. Thev most innocuous question or imagined criticism is met with the superior and condescending arrogance that only repressed ex-public schoolboys seem to be able to manage.

The real horror though in this hotel of horrors is the chef. We had been out for the day and arrived back late. At 8.20 we politely enquired whether it was too late for a table in the restaurant. The hotel rules state last orders at 8.30. Instead of a simple yes or no we were treated to a tirade of abuse and foul language, because apparently he had started to pack up to go home. He seems to have all the temperament and manners of Gordon Ramsey but unfortunately with the cooking ability of Homer Simpson.

This hotel was the worst accomodation I have ever stayed in at any price point, but to charge £115 per night is absolutely outrageous. For me it represents the essence of everything that is wrong with the British tourist industry. Poor accomodation, bad food and staff who treat the guests as if they are doing them a favour by having them there.

Avoid this hotel at all costs.

Andrew.martin23@ntlworld.com