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Reviews of Bel & The Dragon Kingsclere

3.5 out of 5
Bel & The Dragon Kingsclere
Swan Street, Kingsclere, Newbury, England

Reviews

9.6

Exceptional

Rating 10 - Excellent. 119 out of 150 reviews" "
Rating 8 - Good. 24 out of 150 reviews" "
Rating 6 - Okay. 6 out of 150 reviews" "
Rating 4 - Poor. 1 out of 150 reviews" "
Rating 2 - Terrible. 0 out of 150 reviews" "

9.8/10

Cleanliness

9.6/10

Staff & service

9.6/10

Amenities

9.6/10

Property conditions & facilities

8.8/10

Eco-friendliness

Reviews

10/10 Excellent

Heidi

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
The staff make it amazing
My husband and I are Brits but live in the US, we were visiting family for the week and decided last minute (literally 24 hours notice) to spend one night between long car journeys at a B&B halfway, did a quick hotels.com search and found Bel and The Dragon, the only place with a King bed at such short notice. I called to let them know we'd probably not arrive til about 7:30/8pm and spoke to Luke, such a professional, he told me it was no problem and that he'd book a table for us for dinner so we'd catch the kitchen in time. The room was stunning, everything thought of, down to the complimentary tea and coffee, the food in the restaurant was delicious, there is a rec room with games and whisky to help yourself! the staff were amazing, especially Luke the Manager, Lee the barman and Chloe in the morning at breakfast, who was helping this branch due to short notice. We never think to stay in a B&B because we're always staying with family when we come back, but we loved every minute of our stay at Bel and The Dragon, Kingsclere. Beautiful location and most importantly the staff were fantastic.
Stayed 1 night in Jan 2024

10/10 Excellent

Colin, Jackson Hts

Travelled with partner
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, amenities, property conditions & facilities
Cosy, cute and comfortable, very friendly and helpful staff. We loved our visit and plan to stay again soon.
Stayed 4 nights in Dec 2023

10/10 Excellent

David

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
A wonderful stay
A wonderful hotel. Our bed was large and very comfortable. The bathroom had all you need. We ate in the restaurant and the menu was very varied with lots of local produce. The evening meal and our breakfast were delicious. We would definitely stay again. The staff were very friendly making the whole experience execeptional.
Stayed 1 night in Nov 2023

10/10 Excellent

David

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, amenities, property conditions & facilities
Old inn with cottage-style furnishing; Incorporates good restaurant; Good breakfast choices.
Stayed 1 night in Oct 2023

8/10 Good

Shani

Liked: Cleanliness, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
All in all a good stay
Enjoyed our stay. Staff lovely. The only negative was service at breakfast extremely slow and nobody at hand if we needed anything. In the bar area nobody cleared the glasses from the tables.
Stayed 2 nights in Oct 2023

10/10 Excellent

Verified traveller

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
GOOD STAY and meal
Stayed 1 night in Oct 2023

10/10 Excellent

laura

Stayed 1 night in Sep 2023

10/10 Excellent

Kathie

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Stayed 1 night in Sep 2023

6/10 Okay

Karen

Travelled with partner
Liked: Cleanliness
We stayed on an incredibly hot weekend. We were given a small room which overlooked the outside dining area and the extractor fans (noisy & pumping out even more hot air) for the kitchen. We were given a fan, which redistributed the already hot air around the room. It was impossibly difficult to sleep - both noise & heat - including kitchen noise, dining & drinking noise, kitchen staff noise (til late), road noise & then all the bins being emptied very early the following morning. I ended up sleeping in the floor in the shared sitting room space. The staff were apologetic the following morning and moved us to a room at the front of the hotel which was significantly better. Request that you are not in a room called Kisby. I am gluten free and the staff tried hard to provide gluten free alternatives. These were limited but I appreciated their efforts. Beware - Avocado on toast in the morning is overprocessed guacamole. It’s a young team - that tried hard - were friendly - but not what I would have expected for the price we paid. Kingsclere is very pretty and the walking locally was great. The food was good but expensive. Slightly bizarre to have a menu fit for deep autumn when the weather was so hot.
Stayed 2 nights in Sep 2023

10/10 Excellent

Peter

Business traveller
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, amenities, property conditions & facilities
This is a lovely property in the heart of Kingsclere village. Very happy with our stay.
Stayed 1 night in Aug 2023

8/10 Good

Paul

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Looks and feels great, but issues with our room
I really wanted to like this hotel, and there's a lot to like. There are also a few things to dislike. It's a charming, old building that wears its history well. Our room was just off a communal lounge area that was littered with old books, had a vaulted, beamed ceiling and plenty of space to relax, including a complementary decanter of single malt whisky! The room though had some issues. It was booked as a "deluxe double" room but was quite small and not especially well thought-out. There was a large, claw-footed free-standing bath in the room with a shower attachment on the taps, but no shower cubicle, curtain or similar. There was a separate toilet room with a hand basin, but no soap dispenser at the basin, meaning you had to leave and use the other basin that was in the main room. There was no wardrobe space and nowhere to sit other than on the bed. Very little surface top space to put stuff down on too. The main issue was that our bedroom formed part of the fire escape route from this floor. This meant that there was a break-glass outside our room which unlocked the room to allow egress; anybody could access our room at any time without a key. In fact when we tried to lock our door to go out it turned out that this mechanism had been activated and the door simply wouldn't lock. The staff quickly reset and fixed this, but it's very disconcerting. Finally the extraction from the kitchen was right outside the window and very noisy during serving times. Great food though.
Stayed 1 night in Aug 2023

10/10 Excellent

michael

Stayed 1 night in Jul 2023

10/10 Excellent

Brian

Travelled with partner
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities
Nice hotel and food. Friendly staff. Our waitress was lovely. Easy check in/out and good room to spend the night.
Stayed 1 night in Jul 2023

10/10 Excellent

Philip

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Stayed 1 night in Jun 2023

10/10 Excellent

Alice

Stayed 1 night in Jun 2023

10/10 Excellent

Steven

Business traveller
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Great Hotel
Great historical building. Good food with freshly cooked breakfast to order.
Stayed 1 night in Jun 2023

10/10 Excellent

Kate

Travelled with partner
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities
Welcoming and helpful staff and lovely bedrooms at this great pub with rooms. Definitely worth a return visit.

10/10 Excellent

Mark

Travelled with partner
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, amenities, property conditions & facilities
Free Gin in the room, lovely breakfast, comfy beds
Stayed 1 night in Apr 2023

10/10 Excellent

Alex

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities
Stayed 1 night in Apr 2023

8/10 Good

John

Travelled with group
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Family Visit
The pub was very welcoming and had a rustic atmosphere. The room was great containing everything needed for a great stay. I found the only thing slightly below standard was the limited choices on the menu and the food was a little over-cooked, but other than that I would stay there again
Stayed 1 night in Apr 2023

10/10 Excellent

Steve

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, amenities, property conditions & facilities
Wonderful pub with fantastic rooms. I didnt end up having dinner there but the English breakfast was great.
Stayed 1 night in Mar 2023

10/10 Excellent

Fred

Stayed 1 night in Mar 2023

6/10 Okay

Verified traveller

Business traveller
Liked: Cleanliness
Disliked: Staff & service, room comfort
Creaky and drafty. Could be better.
Creaky floorboards above kept me awake/woke me up. Menu I found disappointing. Service was slow. Windows in bedroom didnt close properly which is a concern for security and means you have to have heating on more than would be necessary.
Stayed 2 nights in Mar 2023

6/10 Okay

Andy

Business traveller
Liked: Cleanliness, property conditions & facilities
Disliked: Staff & service, room comfort
Stayed 3 nights in Feb 2023

10/10 Excellent

Arthur

Stayed 1 night in Feb 2023

10/10 Excellent

Edward

Stayed 1 night in Feb 2023

8/10 Good

Peter

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Was very loud because we were overlooking the High Street. When we came back in the evening, we were also met by some drunk and rude young men when heading upto our room
Stayed 1 night in Oct 2022

10/10 Excellent

Steve

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Charming hotel.
Charming village setting and many original features of this historic building. comfortable rooms, great breakfast and good dinner menu. we had a great time.
Stayed 1 night in Sep 2022

10/10 Excellent

Marsha

Stayed 3 nights in Aug 2022

10/10 Excellent

Tracey

Stayed 1 night in Aug 2022
Response from Bel&theDragon on 24 Aug 2022
We are so pleased you enjoyed your stay with us Tracey, and hope you find time to come back a visit us again.

10/10 Excellent

Elizabeth

Business traveller
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Absolutely Fantastic!
Everything from the friendliness of the staff, the location, the property, it's beer garden to the food was exceptional.
Stayed 4 nights in Aug 2022
Response from Bel&theDragon on 24 Aug 2022
Hi Elizabeth,Thank you for your kind review, we are very pleased you enjoyed your stay with us and we do hope you will visit us again soon.

10/10 Excellent

Penny

Travelled with partner
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, amenities, property conditions & facilities
The property was very good and everything was very clean
Stayed 2 nights in Jul 2022
Response from Bel&theDragon on 24 Aug 2022
Hello Penny,Thank you for taking the time to leave us a review, we very much apricate it.We do hope you will visit us again.

10/10 Excellent

Scott

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Friendly helpful staff and lovely place
Stayed 1 night in Jul 2022

10/10 Excellent

Gary

Stayed 1 night in Jul 2022

10/10 Excellent

John

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
15 cenrury charm with excellent food.
Sunday roast was excellent and, so too, was the breakfast. The room was clean, cosy and well equipped even though the place dates back to the 15th century. Indeed, this added to the charm.
Stayed 1 night in Jul 2022

8/10 Good

John

Stayed 1 night in Jul 2022

10/10 Excellent

Helen

Travelled with group
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, amenities, property conditions & facilities
Excellent hotel. The room was large with an incredibly comfy bed and good powerful shower. The staff were really helpful and friendly and the breakfast really good. We ate in the restaurant both nights. A special thank you to Ben our waiter. We would highly recommend Bel and the Dragon.
Stayed 2 nights in Jul 2022

10/10 Excellent

Philip

Stayed 1 night in Jun 2022

10/10 Excellent

Aniela

Stayed 1 night in Jun 2022

10/10 Excellent

Neil

Business traveller
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, room comfort
Really nice place in a historic building. Great staff and very good food. Rooms are all different and very comfortable
Stayed 1 night in May 2022

6/10 Okay

Dr Simon

Very poor breakfast
Stayed 1 night in May 2022

10/10 Excellent

Janice

Stayed 1 night in May 2022

10/10 Excellent

Neil

Business traveller
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Really great place
This is a really nice place to stay. It is a historic building that has been sensitively restored and has bags of character. Each room is different. The staff are very friendly and attentive and make their guests feel at ease. The food is excellent also. All in all, a great place and highly recommended.
Stayed 2 nights in May 2022

10/10 Excellent

chris

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, amenities, property conditions & facilities
Great Hotel , Staff very Friendly !
Stayed 1 night in May 2022

10/10 Excellent

Jeffrey

Stayed 2 nights in Apr 2022

10/10 Excellent

Verified traveller

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
We had a lovely stay. The room was very clean although it was rather noisy being on the front of the hotel. The service was generally good and we were able to to park on site although the car park is small. Food was good and slightly unusual. We would go there again.
Stayed 2 nights in Apr 2022

10/10 Excellent

C

Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Extremely comfortable, very friendly staff. Will stay again if in same area.
Stayed 1 night in Mar 2022

10/10 Excellent

Verified traveller

Business traveller, Travelled with group
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Stayed 1 night in Mar 2022

10/10 Excellent

Sharon

Travelled with group
Liked: Cleanliness, staff & service, property conditions & facilities, room comfort
Stayed 1 night in Jan 2022

10/10 Excellent

Jonathan

Stayed 3 nights in Dec 2021