Belsfield Hotel Regal Hotel, Bowness-on-Windermere

Author's product rating:   

Value for Money	Poor
Quality of Rooms	Average
Standard of Service	Good
Quality of Facilities	Good

Advantages:	Swimming pool and free parking close to the town centre
Disadvantages:	The four stars aren't really justified, they just 'justify' an overpriced hotel

Recommend to potential buyers:

no

Full review

The Belsfield is a bit of a curiosity: I'm not entirely sure whether I enjoyed my stay there or not.

First off: it is set in quite substantial grounds, so it has a reasonable amount of parking space for a hotel this close to the centre of the village, which is most definitely a plus at any time, never mind at the height of the tourist season. I stayed here at the end of November last year - well out of season.

Another plus, if you aren't into lake swimming, it has it's own swimming pool. It also has a sauna, but that is somewhat lukewarm and could do with some renovation, if only to replace the scorched wood! Access to the swimming pool is down a fairly steep flight of stairs and there is no lift access.

The hotel was once a mansion, which explains its somewhat labyrinthine layout. There is a small lift, but because of the hotel's layout, it only provides a somewhat limited access to the rooms. From reviews elsewhere, the rooms themselves are somewhat variable, some of them have been renovated recently: ours was definitely not one of those. Our room was quite small and fairly basic - as was the bed (not good if your other half is 6 foot 3). The bathroom was reasonable, although the bath was a little small. For a premium of about 70 quid (somewhat obscene in my opinion, especially out of season), you can have a lake view, although I'm not sure if they would refund it if the view was obscured by fog all day!

I can't comment on the food, as we didn't eat there, but I can't see how they can justify 15 quid (each) for breakfast (discounted by a fiver for residents), when there are quite a few local cafes around.