Copthorne Effingham Park London Gatwick, Crawley

Author's product rating:   

Advantages:	Cheap, adequate and not badly located for Gatwick Airport .
Disadvantages:	Spoilt by the sports bar .  All - in - all, it's just nothing special !

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Prior to our recent trip to Prague, in the Czech Republic, we decided to stay at an hotel near London's Gatwick Airport overnight in order to facilitate an early check-in. You get into travel mode, you lose anxieties and you don't spend a lot if you use Priceline. Which is what we did.

Searches for a four star hotel proved fruitless. I secretly hoped to net the Hilton (Gatwick South Terminal) or the Sofitel (aka former Le Meridien) at the North Terminal. I lowered my sights to three stars, and was given, in the way that only Priceline can, the Copthorne Effingham Park for UKP 40. A great price. Further research proved that this was, in fact, officially a 4-star hotel. A result. Having actually stayed there, however, I'd have to say that Priceline were probably the more accurate in the ratings game, and I'll go along with them in that respect!

Hotel guests at the Effingham Park divide, roughly, into three, rather unequal, categories. It's got a conference centre, so expect to bump into conference types. It's also situated in 40 acres of parkland, and features a 9-hole golf course (and, no - I'm not going to discuss the golf), so you'll meet golfers a-plenty. Oh - and it's also rather convenient for Gatwick Airport, so you can expect to see loads of happy families waiting to fly to Florida. Or, in our case, Prague.

Falling into the latter category, this hotel was reasonably convenient. The Sofitel would have been better by miles, but Priceline-users cannot be choosers. Of course there are better airport hotels, but this could have its advantages if - and it's a big "if" - it played its cards right.

We arrived and made out where reception was. Conferencing is on the right. Reception is on the left, so we turned left and made our way to check-in, an experience which was slowed down not so much by the staff but by an irritating, egotistical businessman trying to chat-up the receptionist. Once he had unsuccessfully finished, we moved forward and booked in efficiently with her, a friendly South African who tried hard, but unsuccessfully, to accommodate my request for a smoking room. To her credit, she had tried to find a room with a balcony. She cheerfully commented that the windows opened widely. I was grateful for her efforts and, later, hung out of them in time-honoured fashion, social leper that I am!

We took our room key and headed for the lifts. The lift - or elevator - eventually arrived and took us, at what could only be described as a snail's place to the second floor.

Call me sad if you will (Though I'd rather you didn't), but I do take stock of hotel corridors! The dark furnishings were somewhat depressing and almost morbid. Clean? Yes, certainly. Good condition? Yes. Exciting? No. We got to our room and went in. And, well, it was a room. Nothing terribly exciting. The ubiquitous Corby trouser-press hung off the wall at what could only be described as a jaunty angle. The usual L-shape format. Perfectly acceptable, bog-standard, 3/4-star room with double bed, comfy chair and desk - but it just lacked the "Wow-factor", major-league. There was a disappointing element about it, but - as if if this an excuse - it was serving as somewhere to lay our heads before a morning flight. In that respect, it did just what it said on the tin, as they say. It was adequate. Just nothing to write home about, and "Adequate" is hardly an adjective to which a hotel room should aspire, to be really honest. Nor is "Disappointing".

The hotel has, apparently, a great restaurant. That will be a consequence of its conference location status, I guess. We decided, instead, to order room-service. Not a great selection, so we just went for sandwiches. They were good, and were delivered on time and with friendly service. Amanda chose chicken and I opted for prawn - nice, if a little sloppy. Hats off to the management for not offering Ham as a choice; you can imagine the eternal calls to reception saying "Where are my Effingham sandwhiches?". There! I said it!

Being without young Josh on this occasion (and our room would not have been large enough to accommodate an extra bed), we decided to try the bars. There are two. Deep in the bowels of the hotel is the Sports Bar, which boasts far too many television sets; it's, frankly, not the best place for a couple. It's where it belongs; we really weren't very impressed. I've been to better pubs in downmarket, grubby cities than this place. Computer problems caused them, I think, to be unable to charge our drinks to our bill. This was the only plus. Upstairs is the more refined Terrace Bar, which is a lot quieter and a lot more peaceful. It also affords a view of flabby conference delegates showing off a screw-kick in the hotel's rather nice swimming pool directly beneath.

We returned to our room and enjoyed a very comfortable night's sleep. The bed was good.

We checked out early in the morning. This was a slow, tedious process, which showed that the staff weren't entirely at home with the process.

Whatever. These things happen, I suppose.

We had a cheap, comfortable night's stay near the airport. Too flawed to earn four stars, in my humble opinion, this was not, however, a bad place to stay. Priceline are sending us there again in a month's time and I suppose I'm not exactly dreading the fact - if that's not damning with faint praise.

All-in-all, it's so-so. It might be good for golfing or conferencing. It's good, but it's nothing to write home about. So I wrote about it here instead, and I thank you for getting this far!

Andrew