Macdonald Linden Hall, Golf & Country Club - Longhorsley, United Kingdom 

I have just come back from Linden Hall where I went for an overnight pamper package for my friend's hen do. It was fantastic. I have been to a number of spas for pamper breaks over the past few years and this was definately the best. The reason that myself and my friends felt this was the case was due to the excellent service by all the staff. The rooms that we were in were lovely, in the wing next to the spa. I was told by staff that they were due to be refurbished but we felt that they are of a very high standard as they are now. We had an adjoining room with friends and the concierge was more than happy to unlock the door for us. The beauty treatments that we had were fab and all of the girls in the spa were very friendly and also professional. They seem to have the balance just right and made us feel very welcome and special. For the time there we didn't feel like 30 and 40 something year old mums! The only disappointment was that the jaccuzzi still wasn't working. We were told by the staff that it is due to be replaced. There were 11 of us and we were seated for dinner in a separate area of the dining room around one large table. This was great as it meant we did not disturb other guests and could enjoy our meal at a leisurely pace. We visited the Linden Tree pub after dinner, which is right next to Linden Hall. We were lucky enough to hit on a night when they had live music being played by a guitar two piece . The pub is more relaxed and less formal than the hotel and it was a great end to the night. The only negative of the break was that I had a small piece of plastic in my salad at lunch time. I am sure this was entireley accidental and I was very satisfied with the genuine apology by the duty manager. We were all delighted and surprised by the complementary bottle of champagne he brought to us by way of an apology. The bride to be was over whelmed. It was a fabulous end to a lovely break.

Stayed 3 nights on B&B basis, and also chose to eat ‘in’ each night. An excellent and classy hotel. Good base location for visiting the notable places in Northumberland area. It’s situated in its own extensive, and very quiet & beautiful, grounds. The level of service & friendliness from all staff is top notch. As other postings suggested rooms are small, we splurged a bit and booked a higher spec ‘Feature’ room. Excellent choice; great design, stylish & modern and large (24 ft x 21 ft, that including the sparkling bathroom which had bath plus separate shower cubicle). We had room 243, which has the centre three windows immediately above the columned hotel entrance as seen in the hotel’s photos. Nice view, high quality room and excellent housekeeping service. Rooms 235 – 244 have the best views; they’re a mix of sizes and grades. Feature room no 236 is probably the best of all for views. Linden Hall hotel grades rooms as Bronze, Silver & Gold whereas Madonald’s Group (of which Linden Hall is a member) booking service classes them as Classic / Standard, Executive & Feature. Had dinner twice in the Dobson restaurant (fine dining). Enjoyed both, though a bit pretentious and pricy (?26 for two courses, but the ?10 extra for desert was steep IMO). Mark-up on wine was particularly high, but a plus point was that they didn’t push expensive bottled water like most restaurants do (instead they freely offered the local, iced, tap water – a nice touch). For one dinner we ate at the Linden Tree pub, immediately adjoining the main hotel and right by the golf course. Linden Tree provided a good range of up-market pub food at a pleasing price, service also excellent and a nice pub atmosphere. It’s very good to have the two dining options of Dobson and Tree available at the hotel. High quality of food at all times, though chef is surprisingly miserly on portions at the (otherwise good, but highish priced) breakfast. I ordered bacon, egg, tomatoes, mushrooms plus toast. They delivered 1 egg (ok), but accompanied by just 1 bacon rasher, 1 mushroom (yes), 1 (half) tomato & 1 slice of toast (nicely cut into two). That’s the system – pleasantly presented with high quality. On subsequent breakfast orders I specifically stated (increased) numbers of tomatoes etc – and they gave me the exact amount I ordered. Booked via the helpful Macdonald’s Group website. Good website, though encountered a serious problem as the group website and the hotels own computer system don’t seem to be linked automatically. My booking with the group did not get communicated to the hotel. Only by luckily phoning in advance to make a dinner reservation did I find this horrendous error. Got resolved very professionally by the hotel. But – recommend you phone the hotel to check a couple of days after making a booking via MacD’s website or central telephone booking service. Look out for special offers (on website and in Daily Telegraph adverts). We used those and it gave us a slightly reduced room rate and ?15 ‘voucher’ per night to use against the Dobson or Linden Tree dinner costs. In conclusion – a top class hotel in which I would definitely stay again on visiting that area.