Shorwell Holidays from £161

With a huge gym and a 20m swimming pool it is quite a rare find in the area. Avid swimmers note, though, that pool is 30-31 C temperature so vigorous swim in freestyle may have to be cut back due to overheating if used to normal lane swimming temperatures. Understandable, though, as it is used by non-hotel residents & kids so it has to be warmer. Staff were extremely helpful, food menu in the "restaurant" was quite good and breakfast buffet was decent. I had to put "restaurant" in double quotes, and main reason for lowering score: it is a sports bar with astonishing noise levels from the external "clientele" heard on Fri and Saturday evenings. Obviously good revenue stream for the hotel to have locals pop in for shockingly loud vocalisation, but... their absolute lack of basic manners were a novelty. Clearly something attracts type of people who feel entitled to treat it as their literally deafening local pub. I am getting old, but have *never* had hotel dinners in such settings. One sidenote about parking: currently there is a building site on the premises. They occupy large chunk of the large parking lot - so, having paid for parking with the room, it was quite stunning to find that there was ZERO provision or even most basic practical schemes to ensure hotel guests have any priority for parking. All the myriad externals who come to the gym and to shout in the "restaurant" fill up the parking lot and hotel guests can hunt around trying their luck.

The view of Winchester Cathedral from my bedroom was amazing. All of the staff were extremely helpful and positive including promptly resolving air temperature issues in my room. The room was spotlessly clean. But the room felt rather tired with scratched and battered furniture and a dated bathroom. The decor in the bar and restaurant did not reflect the historic location of the building and seemed very generic and unimaginative

For the $91 per night price, this was very good value. Indeed, the property is a mere 5 minutes from the port and train station, which is great. Also, there are good restaurants within a 15 to 20 minute walk. There is a decent full kitchen, although there appeared to be no way to make ice. Be aware that there are no en suite bathrooms, but the bathroom was always available to us, since the property was only about half full. However, only one of the two showers on the second floor where we stayed was functioning during our one-night stay.

Top notch stay. Great breakfast, wonderful staff

The staff were amazing, helpful and very wonderful. My wife and I really enjoyed our time there. The room was great but the bed mattress is a bit old. We would definitely return. Lovely