Oaklands Hotel - Norwich, United Kingdom 

If you can't be bothered to read it all: basically, unless your company is paying, always ask for a substantial reduction. OK for lone business travellers. We stayed at Oaklands, in one of the Lodges (4 of us) in May 2008. I had a good deal paying ?450 for a week with breakfasts. The lodges are as you see on the pictures on the website. However, the bathrom floor was dirty (had sticky brown stuff stuck to it, and balls of dusty fluff in all the corners) under the bed & sofa bed was dusty. They provided 2 towels between 4 of us. I complained and towels arrived being left outside the door on the dirty carpet, they said they would clean the floors but the sticky stuff and dust was still there after! There is a sink, no washing up liquid or cloth, I think they just swill the cups from the tea making under the tap and put them back everyday. I had to rewash everything myself. The big flat screen is good but most peple have these now , you can't claim the place is 'luxury' based on that! If there is 4 of you, bare in mind that the 2nd bed is a sofa and really not suitable to sleep 2 kids bigger than about 5yrs. One of ours had to sleep on the floor. The people who sleep on the sofa bed have to walk through the bedroom to get to the toilet/bathroom, so no privacy. The pool is not heated and is freezing, it was closed when we arrived and they had lost the key to open it. It took till late the next day to get it open by which time the weather had turned. The pool was promptly closed again. My husband didn't bother with breakfast as the selection was poor. Apart from buffet style English breakfast featuring last nights left over potatoes - there was stale cereals (not in the boxes but in containers) weird chopped up concoctions in glasses that were there on the side for days! No bread or pastries as you would expect, you have to ask for toast or you don't get it. Tea or coffee (the coffee is horrible) is offered to you and bought to your table. They market the main hotel for wedding and private parties and it was very loud, noisey with people running about outside the lodges into the early hours all weekend nights. Bed was not very comfortable either. Good points: Foriegn waiter/cleaner was very friendly & nice with the kids and good at cleaning the lodge.

Stayed in Norwich on business at the Oaklands Hotel. Was very impressed - was allocated one of the lodge rooms, which was excellent. Modern, stylish, spacious and very well appointed. Far better than any of the rooms from a large chain. The hotel location was excellent and the grounds were lovely. We ate in the restaurant, and the food was high quality. Would highly recommend this hotel - make sure you stay in one of the lodges.