Dog Friendly Villas In Moray

Reviews

What our customers say about their holidays

• Sharon - Verified booking

  Having just arrived home from our week at The Lookout in Hopeman, we wanted to give you/the owner feedback before our experiences fade to memory.

  Overall, we enjoyed a beautiful week in the area and The Lookout provided us with a super central point from which to explore. Sadly, The Lookout itself, didn’t live up to expectations - especially for the price paid. We had holidayed with our elderly parents, who are able to manage stairs and lower than normal beds - however, our shock on arrival to find that the beds were literally on the floor, found us wanting to turn round and come home. Our folks are in their 70’s, and fit for their ages … but, had we known that they would have to crawl on hands and knees into their bed, we would not have booked The Lookout. Further, the beds were situated under the coombed ceilings meaning that even the most agile and fittest of people had to bend double to get into the bed, crawl from the bottom and manoeuvre into a sleeping position - after what felt like an agility course to get into bed. Getting up from the bed saw the reverse as it was impossible to get out of the bed at the side, the only way out was to crawl back to the bottom and ease out avoiding the coombed ceilings. Our parents banged their heads many times during the week. On our first night, my wife banged her foot on the wooden base of the bed which was not visible under a throw at the end of the bed, and a black and bruised and swollen toe meant a fair bit of pain and discomfort which persists. We enjoyed the ground floor of The Hopeman, the facilities and space was super and we all very much enjoyed the views and the outdoor space. We were disappointed to find that the kitchen was not as clean as we would have expected: the shelving on which glasses were stored rim-down, were not clean, some of the oven trays were very grubby and over-used and the top of the fridge was similarly dusty. The kitchen had no tinfoil or greaseproof paper for use when cooking, which meant the very worn oventrays etc had to be scrubbed clean after each use. The cushions for the two loungers on the deck were beyond threadbare. The shelving in the TV room was very dusty - behind the TV and nearly no-one had reached over to dust them in a while. Skirtings and ledges throughout the house hadn’t been dusted for some time. The house just felt a bit tired and unloved. As to personal storage space: my wife and I spent the week living out of our suitcases on the floor by the side of our bed in the smaller bedroom - there was limited drawer space for 4 adults (with one unit on the landing being used to store the properties linen supplied) and no hanging space at all for dresses etc. Finally, the rubbish bins were stacked at the front door of The Lookout. They had clearly not been cleaned in a very long time and were very smelly. Worse, the green bin had a thriving colony of maggots feasting on the detritus available to them … and I mean, crawling with maggots! So, yes, we enjoyed our holiday but felt awful for our parents as we had no option but to make do with the bedtime challenges. It was disappointing to find on our last evening that the sofa in the downstairs TV room was actually a pull out bed, and had we known that, we would have made that room up as a bedroom for our parents. Perhaps this facility could be advertised and offered for future visitors’ information and benefit. Making it clear that the bedrooms suffer from little or no headroom when entering and rising from the beds (which are mattresses on the floor) would also be helpful information to share with would-be visitors. I’d be grateful if you could respond to this e-mail to advise me of the steps taken to improve The Lookout as I would hate for others to feel as we do, having paid handsomely for use of the house, our expectations fell short of reality. Many thanks Sharon Saunders. PS: We found an item of jewellery (necklace) in the small jewellery box on the chest of drawers in the main bedroom - left by a precious visitor ... we left it in the jewellery box.

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• Dave - Verified booking

  We had to cut our 2 week holiday short by some 5 days due to the pain caused to both my wife and myself by the bed.

  When we arrived, we found the bed mattress to be so firm it was like lying on a concrete block! In all our years of using Sykes as a company which we relied on to provide us with a good holiday, we have never had anything like this before. No matter how hard you pressed, there was very little give on the mattress, and we were unable to rest comfortably without either of us being in pain as if we had slept on the floor. in fact, I have slept on floors in tents while camping right through to comfortable ‘posh’ hotel beds with no discomfort such as this caused. Due to the amount the holiday had cost us, along with the distance travelled to get there, we had pinned our hopes on this being an excellent break, so we endeavoured to stay as long as possible. Imagine my horror of finding my wife in tears on the Tuesday morning and being unable to move due to the pain, and with her being scared to try and sleep there any more, I decided it would be better to bring her home. When we first arrived, there was a terrible musty damp smell throughout and along with the musty smell, that others have also commented on in their reviews, in the kitchen we also found a mouse carcass along with a cardboard Rodent Trap/Bait Box for Mouse Poison Control by the boiler. I appreciate the wildlife problems that can happen and understand the problems therein, but to leave a carcass in the kitchen where food is prepared is certainly not in health and safety considerations or something your guests should experience. As you know, mouse droppings etc are enough for councils to close down establishments where food is prepared. The trap in the kitchen was very dirty and covered in grime as if it had been there for a very long time. This total experience has really soured our impression of the Sykes holiday experience we have enjoyed for many years. Sykes say that they have not had any complaints so if you have had any poor experience at this lodge I would advise you to complain so that things may improve for other visitors.

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• James - Verified booking

  There was no broadband on our arrival.

  I tried reporting the issue on the numbers given for Brodie castle and the duty manager but both went to voicemail. This was around 4pm. The Sunday morning there was a knock on the door and a groundskeeper said but had been contacted and would look at the fault. We heard nothing until Tuesday morning when we got a call to arrange a convenient time for someone to enter the cottage. I explained that we had had to travel home for my wife’s mum’s funeral on th Tuesday and wouldn’t be back until Wednesday evening so with only two days of our holiday left we didn’t want to be tied waiting for repairs. So no broadband all week. Also there were no kitchen towels provided or oven gloves. And no instructions for the heating, the sheets of paper left with information for the cottage said instructions were in a folder in the kitchen but there was no folder. In addition the garden was dug up, whilst we were made aware of this a couple of days before we arrived it was disappointing that we couldn’t sit outside as it’s a key aspect of what we enjoy. Overall it was a very disappointing experience (particularly since we originally booked south lodge).

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• Donald - Verified booking

  Cormack Lodge was very comfortable ( apart from dining chairs!

  ), generally well equipped and furnished to a good standard for a holiday let. Your listing includes a DVD player which isn’t there any more. This was raised with NTS staff at Brodie Castle but nobody got back to us on this. As TV reception is suspect due, I think, to a bad aerial connection, a DVD player is all the more relevant. Some other issues / facts that should be highlighted are: - - lack of any comprehensive information pack relevant to the property (e.g. location of shops or services, local recycling regime and bin collection, simple collated instructions for equipment in property, etc.) - WiFi doesn’t work in lounge so ‘smart’ features on TV don’t work, so no iPlayer or red-button available. - lighting is very dull for reading by, in what is already a fairly dark, shady cottage. - no oven gloves in kitchen and only one thin dish towel for a two-week stay. It should be noted in the listing that there is no mobile phone reception in the property on BT mobile or EE. This was an issue for me because of inability to receive one particularly important incoming call on a medical issue.

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• Carol - Verified booking

  The cottage was clean and comfortable and we had a very enjoyable holiday.

  We would definitely return in the future. The location was excellent with a lake to walk round and the whole castle grounds on the other side of the road, which unfortunately was a very fast one and went right past the front door. The rubbish bin was outside the drive and was full to overflowing when we arrived and was not emptied all week. We had to leave our non recyclable in a bin bag which was tied up on the window sill inside the house as we were frightened that foxes/rats would tear it open if we left it outside. The only other thing that could have been better was that we followed the instructions on how to find the cottage and retrieve the key and then we had no idea where we were in relation to the castle, shops etc and there was no literature inside the cottage and no one to ask. We eventually worked it out but more information, especially on the location of food shops would have been useful.

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