Christmas comes but once a year, and when it does, the all-important Christmas office party needs to be arranged. As you may have read in my review of NG1, my party last year was a bit of a damp squib, but I must say that I was quite pleased with the team’s choice of hotel. The Nottingham Holiday Inn was selected for its central location and for the price that was offered for bed and breakfast – and I’m quite confident that I would come here again.

The Nottingham Holiday Inn occupies a superb central location. For a start, the hotel occupies several floors, and is perched on the top of a hill, so if you get a room on one of the upper floors, you are guaranteed a good panoramic view. My room was on the sixth floor, and looked straight out over the city, directly in front, and onto the floodlit castle to the left. If you do decide to make arrangements to stay here, make sure you deal with the City Centre hotel, as there is another Holiday Inn at Castle Marina Park.

The hotel itself is in a particularly good position, because it really is very close to all the different locations. A short walk across the main road will bring you out in the middle of the city centre, where you can find all the shops during the day and all the pubs and clubs by night. Nottingham Castle is within walking distance from the hotel, as is the Tales of Robin Hood Museum – an interactive tour of Nottingham’s history. The National Ice Arena and Trent Bridge Cricket Club are also both close by.

The hotel itself is quite a strange building in that it seems to perch on the side of the road and towers upwards rather than outwards. This is evident as soon as you walk in, because the ground floor contains only the reception desk and a few lounge chairs and tables. The next floor up is for the cloakroom and toilets, the floor above that is the bar and restaurant and it isn’t until you get one floor further up again that you find any of the bedrooms. It’s worth taking a minute or two to familiarise yourself with this, otherwise you’ll find yourself in and out of the lifts all evening.

ROOM

The bedroom was a decent enough size, with a double bed, bedside table, desk and small armchair. It has to be said that there wasn’t a vast amount of floor space around the room, but I think “cosy” would have been a fair description. The room was extremely stuffy – the weather was quite cold outside, and so the rooms had been heated to sauna-like temperatures. Even though the air conditioning was on cool, the room still seemed very hot, and I had to open the windows to let in some fresh air. As the room was up high, the windows were fitted with safety catches, to stop you falling out – but it has to be said that they didn’t feel very strong, and wobbled rather precariously whilst I was sat on the window ledge.

The bathroom was larger than average, plain and artificially lit. The bath was a good size, and there was plenty of hot water, but the shower came without a spray attachment, so the water blasted out of it like a police water cannon. The shower curtain was a bit flimsy and I quickly found myself with a large puddle all over the bathroom floor. The floor itself was covered in linoleum, which had been kept very clean but had clearly seen better days. The edges were cracked and curled, and overall the room looked a bit shabby. The toilet had the heaviest lid I have EVER seen and whilst using it in the night, I opted to sit down rather than stand up for fear of getting something trapped under it.

Due to the seasonal timing of our visit, the restaurant was serving a pre-paid Christmas menu, which gave a three-course meal for £15 per head. This was certainly a popular choice – the restaurant was packed when we turned up and I was glad that we had booked a table. I really enjoyed the meal in the restaurant because the hotel had tried hard to get everyone in the mood. The table service was very quick – perhaps a little hasty in hindsight – and everyone was given party poppers, hats and those balloons that scream round the room when you let the air out. This was not the place to come for a quiet meal, it has to be said.

In the morning, we had our breakfast in the restaurant, and this went down an absolute treat. The breakfast normally costs £13.95, but was included in our room rate. Everything was once again served buffet style, but the food was all piping hot and very fresh. Anyone that regularly eats cooked hotel breakfasts will know that this isn’t always the case. I filled my face, much to the dismay of my colleagues, who could barely manage a glass of orange juice. Am I the only person in the world who gets ravenous with a hang over?

Holiday Inns are generally quite flexible when it comes to price and it’s always worth checking out offers before you book. We negotiated a £70 bed and breakfast rate, which was a fair price given the standard of accommodation. I wouldn’t be inclined to pay much more than this, because the rooms (and the bathrooms) are a bit tired, but the standards of service were very good, and we had a very pleasant stay. The location was great and the view of the castle a nice extra. I would, of course, reserve final judgement until I undertake a non-festive stay, but otherwise was very pleased.