Blaauwklippen Manor by NEWMARK

The restored building is beautiful, and the rooms are spacious with stylish finishes. The pool area was spotless and the setting is excellent. I can imagine this place delivering a five-star stay once it has had time to settle in, but ours fell well short. We only found out after arriving that the hotel had been open for a few days. That explains some of the teething problems, but we weren’t told in advance and weren’t offered a rate that reflected the unfinished service. It felt like we had become test guests. In our room, the TV hadn’t been programmed, the air conditioning only circulated warm air, and several lights didn’t work. Staff were friendly and seemed keen, but clearly hadn’t been fully briefed, so the service wasn’t at the level expected here. There were no towels at the pool and no bar service. Some of the food we ordered, which cost extra on top of the room, was inedible. After checkout there was nowhere to leave our luggage, a basic thing I’d expect from a hotel presenting itself as five-star. We had to rearrange our plans for the day because of it. The way our concerns were handled made the stay more frustrating. I raised several issues directly with the manageress more than once, but she showed little interest and was noticeably unhelpful. Even if things couldn’t have been fixed straight away, feeling heard would have made the problems easier to accept. The renovation and location give the hotel a lot of potential, but it opened too early and guests are dealing with the growing pains. Service, communication, and basic readiness need major improvement. As things stand, it didn’t meet expectations.

For R11,000 a night, waiting 40 minutes to be served breakfast was shocking. Valentine’s weekend also passed without any special effort from the staff, not even a red rose or a glass of champagne. There was no turndown service, and the Christmas flowers were dead, with water left standing in the room. Really disappointing. I won’t be back.

The Manor House is lovely, but at this price I expected turndown service. Breakfast was very slow, and nobody helped with our luggage at checkout.

Such a beautiful place, with lovely rooms and excellent service.