We arrived at the breakfast room a little later than usual to find that breakfast room had more people in it than on previous days. This meant that the self-service breakfast was warmer than the previous day.
We drove to Chichester to visit the Cathedral and get another stamp in my Cathedral passport. We enjoyed the Cathedral in a way that we didn’t when we stayed in Chichester many years ago. On our previous visit the space was full of artworks obscuring the architecture so we could not enjoy the Cathedral at its best.
We had lunch in the Cathedral Café, where after having had a cooked breakfast, I opted for an Apple Danish pastry (one of my five a day ????).
After lunch we walked around the nearby Bishop’s Palace gardens which looked delightful in the sunshine. As we walked through the town towards the car it was sad to see empty shops where businesses had closed in the main street. I was also saddened to see homeless people; I don’t remember seeing any on my previous visit.
We set the SatNav to avoid motorways and drove back to Winchester via a leisurely route through the countryside in glorious sunshine.
Later we dined in Brasserie Blanc where I chose vegetable risotto, which was delicious, and Mr C chose steak followed by a cheeseboard. After dining we called in at the nearby Royal Oak for a post dinner drink. The beer wasn’t to Mr C’s taste so we returned to the hotel for one last drink before retiring to our room for the evening.
We arrived at the hotel shortly after 10pm to be told that the bar had just closed! The girl behind the bar was on the phone to her boss at the time and explained that customers had just arrived and asked if they could be served. The answer was NO!
We walked off in disgust. We were not experiencing the advertised 5-star rating that the hotel advertises. So far, it was the worst ever hotel had I had ever experienced. We were both regretting booking the extra two nights on the spur of the moment, just because we could now that Mr C has retired.
It is the management of the various facilities which all seem to be subcontracted out that is the problem, the staff were mostly lovely. I suspect part of the problem is the hotel struggling to cover its costs. By now I was noticing that the quality of things such as serviettes and toilet paper had declined since we arrived.
