Church View

The house itself is nice, but it needs a proper deep clean and much better attention before guests arrive. We came for my mother's 80th birthday surprise, and I was glad I got there first to clean before the rest of the family. The smell on arrival was awful, though the bedrooms were okay after airing the place and using a lot of air freshener. The utility room was in a bad state, and I had to empty water from the tumble dryer's condenser. Kitchen utensils were dirty, a towel had blood stains, some sheets were stained, and the tea towel smelled of grease. The sticky, slightly wobbly kitchen table needed wiping down too. The en suite shower had such low pressure that nobody else could be bathing or showering at the same time. After I complained, neither Sykes Holiday Cottages nor the owner seemed to care. The owner denied there were problems. I made the mistake of cleaning up because my mother was due within the hour and I wanted the place to smell fresh. Don't clean up their mess, or you'll just get excuses. Eight different witnesses saw that ice build-up made the freezer unusable, yet I was told that was perfectly normal. There were dead flowers in the living room too. Unless you want a major clean-up job, I'd avoid staying here, and I wouldn't book through Sykes Cottages because they won't help with complaints.