It would seem over the last few months I've spent almost as much time staying in Hotel rooms as I have in my own flat, which can prove rather costly. One of my more recent excursions was to the Novotel in Friar Street in reading. Now being as how I only live in Basingstoke, getting a hotel for the night in Reading might seem a little bit pointless, but as it was my leaving do from work it seemed a cheaper and simpler option than trying to get home. That said, once all the little extra bits and pieces are added on it soon mounts up and what seemed like a good idea at the time, was perhaps a little too close to home to justify.

Having booked it all a couple of weeks before all I had to do now was turn up and enjoy my stay. The hotel itself is located on Friar Street in Reading; about 5 minutes walk from the Train Station. It is incredibly easy to find given the large luminous Blue sign hanging from the front of the building. The hotel does offer a small amount of private car parking accessed from the rear of the hotel from Gerard Street. Had I known before parking there that it would cost me £14 to get my Car back out again I would have opted to pay the £10 overnight charge to use the NCP Car Park on Gerard Street instead. This would perhaps be my biggest complaint with the whole stay, the fact that I didn't know that firstly the parking wasn't included and secondly that it would be so expensive before I left my car in the car park, in fact it wasn't until I tried to leave the following morning that I found out.

The room itself was pretty standard fair. As you enter the room you have a small corridor with a toilet next to the front door, mini bar and tea and coffee making facilities and a small safe, before heading into the main room. Once into the main part of the room you will find what the Novotel call a Supreme bed, to me it just looked like a King Size but then I'm no expert. Next to that is a sofa and then on the other side of the room is a dressing bench and mirror and also a 17" flat Screen TV. In a separate room off to the side of the bedroom is then the main bathroom, which consisted of a sink and separate Bath and shower. All in all the facilities within the rooms are pretty good and if you pay the promotional rate you certainly get a decent deal for your money.

When it came to the actual reason I had opted to stay in the hotel that night it certainly can't be faulted. The hotel is ideally situated in the middle of Reading meaning it just required a stumble back to the room once the night was over. The bed was very comfortable and incredibly spacious. The bathroom had everything you could possibly need with a pretty powerful shower that was easy to control both the flow and temperature of. I have to say the quality of my stay was certainly very high and despite the price of the extras still worked out to be reasonably good value for money.

Overall it is a really nice hotel to stay in and as long as you don't intend to bring your car to the Hotel's own car park it is in an ideal place for the centre of town. The rooms and corridors were spotless and the facilities provide were certainly top of the range. When you consider all these points along with the bargain price you will end up paying for the room it certainly makes a night in a Novotel, a 4 Star hotel, very much an affordable proposition. Ok it's not as affordable as a Travel Inn or Travelodge but at the same time the service and quality of the hotel is that little bit better. They do try and make the saving back on the additional items but that's only to be expected and after all you don't have to take them up on them.