The Old School House

The room situation was a mess from the start. We’d booked two bedrooms for two nights from 6 August, but a cleaner showed us to just one room because Martin Connolly was working and wasn’t there to meet us. When we asked for separate rooms, Martin Connolly said they were all booked and blamed a Vrbo mistake. I asked for a refund and was told I could try, but Vrbo hadn’t paid him. I later left a bad review with Vrbo and on their Facebook page. The room itself was presented as the “romantic room,” with two tacky electric candles on the bedside table. There were no chairs, so I had to fetch one from the landing. The dated sideboard had a roll of sellotape and loads of remote controls in its top drawer. Butter, jam and milk were in the fridge, presumably for the stale croissants left on the sideboard. The en suite had a miniature chaise longue wedged by the door and bare shelves, one holding a coffee machine. There was also an extension lead behind the bed with a plug socket that looked very precarious and unsafe. Outside, the driveway was cracked and uneven. There wasn’t really a balcony or outdoor place to relax, just a table and two chairs on a tiny deck beside an unfinished shepherd’s hut and debris in the “garden.” Appalling misrepresentation online. Stay away.

The room itself was fine, but my wife and I left because we no longer felt safe after the way the host spoke to us. We were made uncomfortable almost immediately, and the whole stay felt like an inconvenience to him. When we arrived, he didn’t know which room we’d been assigned and guessed from our Booking.com booking. After we checked the photos and realised it was the wrong room, I rang the doorbell at the front and explained. He complained that we didn’t know the door code, then came to the room and reprimanded us for having sat on the bed. At first I thought he was joking, but he was serious, saying he’d have to change and clean the room and go up and down the stairs. We left straight away. When we returned the key, he kept shouting and was rude to my wife, approaching her in a way that felt threatening. He slammed the door in her face, and the property’s Ring doorbell came off. I’ve never had an experience like this. If zero stars were possible for the service, I’d give that. Don’t stay here.

Trying to find the place in the middle of the night was a horrible start. Google Maps put it at the end of the street, but the Uber driver even got out to help me search in the dark, and we still couldn’t find it. When I called the “hotel,” the person on the phone insulted me. He came outside and carried on insulting me, seemed to head back in, then came out again and continued. The bed was extremely uncomfortable, an old spring mattress. The included “breakfast” was a joke, too. I travel a lot, and this was by far my worst experience: bad sleep and even worse hospitality. I couldn’t recommend it less.

After travelling for hours to get to an event, I found out the owner had cancelled the room I’d booked weeks earlier, that same day. An email was supposedly meant to be sent, but we never got one. Everywhere else was booked up, so we’re now being forced to sleep in the car.