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Hotels General Discussion

Nerdsticks said:
If you're wanting a little more than a Premier Inn: availability can be tough but like a lot of others on here, I really recommend the Chained Oak B&B.

It's much cheaper than the resort, does an amazing full English, and the service is brilliant. If you don't mind a walk through a field and dodging cow pats it's no different from walking from the standard Car Park. I'll probably only stay there from now on until the resort significantly improves their offering. Their cabin room is definitely the nicest but the standard rooms are also decent.
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Really nice place that, also the bridge house next to The Talbot in Alton is decent. They do the best Thai food in the restaurant below that’d knock spots of anything available on park.
 
so uh i found out that the pirate rooms at splash landings are no longer available to book, don't appear on the booking page, and also have been removed from the resort virtual tour (accessible via conferences page). perhaps the rooms have been discontinued for some odd reason or something idk?
 
Fammy said:
so uh i found out that the pirate rooms at splash landings are no longer available to book, don't appear on the booking page, and also have been removed from the resort virtual tour (accessible via conferences page). perhaps the rooms have been discontinued for some odd reason or something idk?
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That’s funny given they used a picture of the pirate room for the pirate takeover event in Feb trying to get people to stay over in the hotels in the themed rooms!
 
Onsite stays via merlin holiday club have been reduced from up to 20% to now up to 15%

Not sure when that was changed yet its very recent indeed
 
AT86 said:
Well that’s rank.


From: https://www.instagram.com/p/DUQPLz3jEjj/?igsh=MXQ4Y2t4MzZ0ZnA1Yw==
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Yeah it is rank but let's not jump to conclusions here. Just because cleaning is usually done in January and hasn't been done yet doesn't mean it won't be cleaned by March. Don't forget that Towers and Staffordshire have had quite a bit of bad weather in January, with a fair amount of snow and ice. All it needs is their cleaning company to have let them down or they've decided to clean other things first (Corkscrew?). Maybe the company doing the Corkscrew at the entrance will be doing this afterwards. Give them the benefit of the doubt for now.

If it is still like it on opening day (or the start of Feb half term) then there's every reason to be annoyed by the state of the cleaning.
 
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Pretty sure you can’t use de-mossing chemicals over winter (no idea why but the bottle I have in the garage says not for use between November and March).

@rob666 might know..

That’s not to say I expect them to actually clean it however.
 
Algon, the gentle patio cleaner, would do fine.
£9.00 per 2.5l
Two tubs would do the lot, no scubbing, just spray it on.

Complete job, 2 hours labour and a spraygun, about sixty quid, plus 20 materials.
Lasts six months.

Sorry, fully booked.

And I should add, that is typical for this winter, we have had mainly rain and showers every week since bonfire night.
Very wet winter.
I have only had about a dozen safe working days outdoors since then.
 
I wasn't going to post but on Saturday we went to the Waterpark (1st day open since the Christmas event) and I've never seen it in such a state.

- Blocked toilets
- Broken changing cubicles
- Grimy pools
- No self service screens working in the food cave, everyone had to pay on one till which then went down, they were then writing people's order down and sending them to the other outlet to pay.
- TV screens not working in slide queues
- Everything needed a lick of paint and a clean

And then a separate pick up, all of the themed stairs / railings have now been removed and replaced with unthemed silver fences.
 
I had a really daft idea the other day of going up for two nights over Feb half term for a little break.

Then I saw the price of £669 appear (ATH). For a barely open theme park. No dinner included.

Needless to say we won’t be heading up that way for the half term. In relation to the photo - the hotel is open all year so regardless if you stay in Jan or in June you should expect to find the same standards.

You do in other hotels.
 
After four months of over average rainfall, there will be a large amount of green canopies and shades out there at the moment.
That nice fountain will keep the algae humidity up as well.
 
rob666 said:
After four months of over average rainfall, there will be a large amount of green canopies and shades out there at the moment.
That nice fountain will keep the algae humidity up as well.
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Thing is, the canopies could have been cleaned on the first day of the closed season back in November, but as @rob666 says, above average rainfall will cause discolouring of canopies over the 2 or 3 months since. So why waste money cleaning it early on in the closed season for those few (in comparison to high season) who stay at the hotel over winter, when you can clean it nearer opening time when (hopefully) the weather isn't as wet and more people would appreciate it.

I really hope enthusiasts and content creators will be this picky with Universal and criticise them when their buildings suffer a similar fate over the UK winters in years to come when someone notices the dirt. But of course they won't because, well it's Universal and not Merlin.
 
I’m sure people will critique universal the same with all the other parks discussed in these forums including those non Merlin (BPB for example)

One must only assume that this dirt will be addressed before February half term with guests paying hundreds to stay in what is classed as the “premium” hotel.
 
There’s some pretty ludicrous arguments being rolled out here as a defence for some pretty basic, obvious cleaning just not being done.

The algae hasn’t appeared overnight. The hotel is open. It’s possible to clean something more than once a year. It’s possible to clean stuff in the winter.

This isn’t an oversight or blip, it’s just yet another example of standards across the park being in the absolute doldrums.
 
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