Large Cottages in Derbyshire with Hot Tubs

Reviews

What our customers say about their holidays

• Andy - Verified booking

  This is not to be seen as a negative review and I hope you take the feed back as constructive comments.

  We had a brilliant family week and the location for central Castleton is brilliant. But the property is needing some TLC. Most kitchen utensils were provided - but we are glad we brought our large wok for cooking for a family of 7. There's no garlic crusher and an additional chopping board would be good. It might be worth sharpening knives or providing new ones as the ones provided are woeful. Not a massive issue to us, but there's no gate on the fence facing the public car park which could be a close call for potentially escaping dogs when front door opened. The front door supporting brace needs replacing as it is broken and you have to lean on the door to close it. There is no key for the side patio doors (that we found). The stable door at the rear does not close properly unless you really push it and lock the door from the inside. This is annoying if you are sitting outside. It becomes dangerous for little children and their fingers. No light bulb in small room and no replacements or spares anywhere. Dishwasher needs salt to be provided - there was none that we found, so it often didn’t clean very well. Tumble dryer - doesn’t dry clothes completely dry. Accessible electric cables/wires under tv are not only visible and unsightly, but grabbable by a child unless really supervised. The welcome book is lacking any real details about managing the property itself. The bins - although it can’t be helped - were 3/4 full on arrival. There is also a lack of details for bin day collection point. I placed the green bin in the car park, but luckily I saw the bin crew at 6:30am and they said they only collect from the roadside. There is no hot tub information/ upkeep details what so ever. Luckily, we knew we had to add chlorine as the slow release container floating around had run out by Wednesday. Who knew you had to remove this when in use? I can only compare to other places I've been where staff visited twice a day to check levels. It shouldn't be down to guests to manage the safe use of a hot tub, with no instructions. There are no spare bedding or pillows (its stated beds can be pulled apart if needed which is great, but there are no extra duvets provided) there is also an under sheet missing. The curtain in the living room is annoyingly short. Cleaning, just generally could be better. It seems a surface clean is done, rather than a thorough turnover. There are cobwebs and spiders in most room corners, the worst place being above the kitchen fridge. Bathroom window is in need of repair (there was a note on the window) however the bathroom door in the same room also doesn’t close properly. In addition, the toilet seat is moving and needs to be fixed/ replaced. King size bedroom en-suite shower doors don’t close completely, and tray floods - due to blockage. Stairs are loud and need new wedges, difficult to move up and down the stairs at night time without waking others and one gets a sense that the stairs are going to collapse! Security for dogs and young children in the garden is concerning given the proximity to the main road and it is fortunate we were fastidious in supervision. We had to move any wood lying around to form a barrier to deter them from escaping, especially towards the car park side. There were many screws lying around in the rear pebbled area that we picked up following construction of the welcome cover to hot tub. It seems a missed opportunity to encompass the fire pit and grassed area along with the pebbled area into a wholly securely fenced area. The seating area along the fence in the pebbled area, along the roadside, by the hot tub is a great idea, but it is too high. It needs to be halved in height to sit comfortably on. This is by far the main area we used A seat leg was broken on the arm chair in the living room by window. We ended up balancing this many times so it could be used. The oven has a weird funny smell when in use Castleton experienced a massive power cut during our stay, so the burglar alarm needs resetting as it was beeping and there was an issue rebooting the WiFi and TV but we conquered that eventually. I come back to the Welcome pack, there were no instructions how to do any of this. A clock would be nice on the fireplace in the living room. It takes two adults to lift the hot tub lid on and off. Actually 3, the first time we used it we leant the lid against the fence, but it dropped down the back and it took 3 adults to get it out (2 in the spa). Whilst the lady cleaning the hot tub was utterly pleasant, she arrived at around 8:30am, but check out is at 10. The hot tub was being drained by before 9am, which didn’t allow any use for the morning of departure had we wanted to. Fortunately we didn't, but we were just not expecting anyone so early. Again, I come back to the welcome pack (lack of) information if 8:30 am is the norm.

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• David - Verified booking

  Accessibility a real problem for normal cars.

  Doesn’t live up to 5 tick rating. Getting to the cottage is a real problem for normal cars. A long, rough, very potholed track - difficult to avoid scraping the bottom of the car - quite stressful. We would hesitate to recommend the cottage for this reason. Apart from that there are lots of positives. It's spacious and generally well equipped. Big, interesting garden. Good location (once you've overcome the track) for the southern Peak District. Kids loved the hot tub. You can also walk into the interesting town of Belper. But the 5 ticks from Sykes (and the price) comes with certain expectations- and it didn't match those expectations. None of the problems are major, you can live with them, but that is not what is expected. A list: Several of the bedrooms have no wardrobe or hanging space (living out of a suitcase isn’t luxury) On arrival you are met with the barn full of unsightly rubbish (it's out of sight from the house though) The garden could do with a decent tidy-up. Things that are missing: black rubbish bags, tea towels, washing up scrubbers (all these were provided when asked). Also enough soap, dishwasher tablets, washing detergent, paper towels. There has become an expectation of a bit of a welcome pack. Sorry to sound ungrateful but one bottle of wine and one packet of crisps amongst 12 people doesn’t really cut it. Could also do with checking that pots and pans have been washed up properly - which they weren't

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• Julie - Verified booking

  We’ve just got back from a lovely weeks’ stay at Matlock Views.

  We were 5 adults and a 3 year old staying for most of the trip.The whole house was clean and well-equipped and we enjoyed the views and the hot tub immensely. Mum, Dad and little boy took the middle floor and Granny and Grandad and Auntie had the attic rooms. We enjoyed going to Matlock Farm Park, Bakewell, Chatsworth, Hardwick Hall, Belper, Cromford Mill and Peak Adventure at Rowsley. Our only real gripe was the quality of the bedding in our room on the top floor. The pillows were wafer thin and the duvet “cover” was about a foot too short for the duvet and had big holes in it! I slept in the en suite double on the last night and it was much more comfortable. We were a bit confused as to which was our “front door” when we arrived and indeed a hen party barged into our accommodation on the Saturday thinking they were staying in ours! The hot tub was checked on the Tuesday and given how heavy the lid was we’d put the two patio tables behind it to help take the weight. The guy checking the chemicals unhelpfully put them both back which was weird given we had another three days to go…Going forward you may also want to look at the radiator in the single bedroom where our grandson slept as it didn’t come on once the whole week, nor did the extractor fan in the main bathroom.

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• Kirstin - Verified booking

  Lovely house, well appointed, clean, comfortable and tastefully decorated.

  We had an excellent holiday meeting up with another family with 4 young children between us. We took our own travel cot and high chair as these were not supplied. The children enjoyed lots of space to play and a big bath. The location is excellent for Matlock centre and only 10 mins walk to the train station (a bit longer walking back up the steep hill!) and closer for a very good park, several cafes and bars and the lovely micropub 'the news room' up the hill. We also enjoyed the hot tub! Only a few minor points which could be improved: we would have liked a cafetiere (although ample supply of instant coffee provided along with tea, a big box of biscuits, some oil, sauces and other bits and bobs of food which were very thoughtfully provided.) Not an issue in October, but pale vertical blinds in the bedrooms would be insufficient in the summer- on a previous holiday elsewhere with similar our children were awake from 4.30am! Some blackout blinds or curtains would be a valuable addition to this house. The parking area is badly pot-holed which may not be in the owner's control, but a simple warning to be aware to park very slowly and carefully would be helpful. These were all minor issues for us however and we would happily stay here again (in the winter months).

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• Michael - Verified booking

  Location and cleanliness of the Accomodation was fine, as expected.

  As this was a new build, would have expected the door handle in the main open plan kitchen not to have fallen off a number of times during the stay, there were only 50% of the required screws in the handle. Also, as listing is for a hot tub cottage I would have expected the water quality, temperature and level to be correct and maintained before our stay. The water level was so low there was an error message on the display & a film on the water meaning we couldn’t use, as a regular hot tub user this hadn’t been maintained for a number of months looking at the film on the water and colour of the filter! While using the outside space it was evident there was a wasp nest in the shed right by the seating area making this hardly usable despite the good weather. Finally, as the caretaker explained, the current building regulations mean that all windows must be escape windows which would have been fine had they been fitted with safety latches which they were not and therefore dangerous for our children of 7&8 in a three storey house. Overall a very disappointing stay due to some basic failings!

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