Big Cottages & Group Accommodation in Harlech

Reviews

What our customers say about their holidays

• Robin - Verified booking

  The views over Harlech castle towards the sea are incredible.

  The property is in a great location. It has a good amount of parking. The living space down stairs is a good size. The two larger bedrooms and the lounge have fantastic views. The garden is lovely. However: - the property was quite dirty on arrival. We filled the vacuum cylinder from the lounge rug alone when we had to vacuum on arrival! Some of the kitchen items needed washing before use. - Parts of the finishing are tired. For instance the second bedroom carpet is threadbare with no underlay. Lots of the floorboards creak. There is only one front door key provided. All of the kitchen knives are blunt. There isnt a complete set of matching crockery. The indicator lights on the cooker dont work. There is no booklet provided with info such as what to do with rubbish. - The property is not suitable for young children: A stairgate can't be fitted to the bottom of the stairs and the stairs are open so a child can fall over the side. This is not shown in the property photos The stair gate provided for the top had rusted through the metal joints. The owner did quickly provide a replacement when we told them but the stair opening is narrower than a standard door so a standard stairgate does not fit. This left the staircase very dangerous for our infant. The high chair is very old and dirty. Parts of it are broken (for instance the securing pins for the legs to attach to the chair, and the restraining strap is incomplete). There are several dangerous flooring areas for young children (for instance broken sharp tile edges in the bathroom, sharp unfinished edges of tiles, broken parts of the laminate flooring) The bedroom wardrobes are in two loose separate (top and bottom) parts so a child could pull the top half over. They are also not secured to the wall. The bathrooms are so small that its very difficult to fit an adult and a child in at the same time. Unfortunately the issues above mostly affecting children limited our enjoyment of what could easily be an outstanding property.

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• John - Verified booking

  If, like us, you like long walks with the dogs followed by a relaxing glass of wine in your patio/garden then retire to watch your favourite TV, then this is not the place for you.

  There were a couple of inaccuracies in the descriptive & one glaring omission that if we’d seen any of them they would have precluded us booking here. The descriptive stated it had a Smart TV, this was not the case, the TV was being used as a monitor to view the freesat so just live programs with no facility to pause or rewind. I texted the number on discovering this & queried whether this was the case & got a terse, in my opinion rude, one word text “correct”. This was followed up with an apology 15 mins later when they obviously realised the detail was incorrect. Fortunately I was able to use the Xbox, (after calling my son to set up an account), & downloaded the iPlayer, Netflix apps that way. But if you’re not technically minded this could be tricky. The descriptive stated: “The enclosed courtyard is the perfect place to relax and unwind after a busy day out and about, dine alfresco and in the evening” but it fails to mention that the adjoining restaurant has a bar area outside so when sitting in the courtyard you have the drinkers in the bar sat next to you with just a small wall separating you, this also doesn’t stop the smoke from the smokers. The glaring omission also involves the courtyard as on arrival you are met with this in the welcome pack: “You might on occasion see delivery people delivering supplies to the cafe next door through the shared access at the bottom of the garden. They will walk along the path along the back wall through the wooden gates. They should leave quickly but they are sometimes absent minded and leave the gate open (mind your pets)” This meant that we had to go outside with the dogs every time they wanted to go out in case they ran into the car park/road immediately outside the gate. Both these issues rendered the outside area neither private nor secure. As stated previously, if the cottage descriptive on the Sykes site had been accurate & clear the we would not have booked here.

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• Geff - Verified booking

  The property is in a great location and is spacious.

  Unfortunately the property requires some significant TLC. On arrival the first thing you notice is two plant pots on the doorstep containing long dead plants which isn't very welcoming. Then unlocking the door is a problem as you have to jiggle the key around and push and pull the door in order to get the key to turn. It's the same on the inside so potentially a H&S issue. In the kitchen the microwave was filthy with burnt on food so not used. On some of the pans and a baking tray the non-stick coating had been rubbed down to the base metal and on some it was lifting so not good to use. The dish washer was, like in the microwave, dirty. In the downstairs shower room one of the shower doors was hanging loose on just one of the rollers so at risk of falling off. The toilet brush there and in the upstairs bathroom were both absolutely filthy - stained and with dried faeces. It was impossible not to notice that because they were the cheap plastic kind in open containers. The full length mirror in one of the bedrooms was covered in stains as if someone had spat on the mirror and it had run down. The pillows were either old and worn out or were new and cheap as they were completely flat. The electric heaters were inadequate for the size of the house and came on at odd times. I found it impossible to either alter the temperature or the timing as they displayed a "blocked" notice when that was attempted. The starter pack for the solid fuel fire that is mentioned in the listing was absent. The furniture in the lounge was however comfortable and the outside space was very good. Harlech is one of my favourite places in the world so I was pleased to be there. The property however was a let down but it only needs a relatively small amount spent on it to bring it up to a decent standard and also for it to be cleaned and maintained by someone with more commitment than is evident at the moment.

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• Jonathan - Verified booking

  Lovely cottage exactly as described.

  It's in a great location, literally a ten second walk out of the back gate to the castle visitors centre. There is also a shop just up the road for bits and bobs, a bistro within a minutes walk and you are about a minutes walk from the high street. The living room is big but very cosy, the kitchen is well equipped with a little utility room just off it with a washer, dryer and a dish washer. Next to the kitchen is another room with a two seater sitee a TV and a PlayStation. I can imagine this would be a good place for children to have there own space away from the main living room. Upstairs there are three bedrooms, one with amazing views of the castle, a small room with a set of bunk beds in, definitely a kids room as it's got a book case with some children's books in. There is also another bedroom, the biggest of the three, you have also got a nice veiw of the mountains from this room, though its not a full veiw as other houses are in the way, but from the bed you can lay there and see the mountains. There are two bathrooms, one downstairs with a toilet and shower and a bigger family bathroom upstairs with a bath and an electric shower over it. We had a welcome pack of milk, bread, butter and biscuits . Parking as stated is for two cars, just a note that it's quite a tight squeeze through the gates though. Apart from that though, I can't actually find any fault at all. We would definitely recommend and we will definitely go again.

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• Andrew - Verified booking

  Lovely property and great location but let down by small things.

  In spite of my earlier enquiry about cleanliness, the oven and cooker hood were thick with grease; the frying pans were rusty (and yes, I spent some of my holiday time cleaning them for use); the kettle leaked and I would consider it to be actually dangerous; the 'Information pack' was 3 years out of date with the previous owners details in it (the TV wasn't working when we got there and only when I'd phoned the previous owner, and then got the present owner's number, did someone come round and set it up. ) We were left a tiny pack containing just 2 dishwasher tablets, one J-Cloth and one black bin liner for the week; No towel roll or floor cloths etc - after the brilliant cottage in Bellingham last year and the house we had previously rented (twice) in Harlech this was a bit of a disappointment. On leaving the key safe jammed and as we left at 0700 we couldn't contact anyone about it. It is also worth mentioning that several of the bowls and plates were already chipped and we (and subsequent users) do not want to be held to account for that.A perfect location that just needs attending to

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