I stayed (I think) almost 3 weeks. Gad. In that time I developed an affliction for well poured Guinness (thank you Kayleigh and Emma) and a thirst for Lagavulin single malt (thank you annonymous 40th birthday reveller).

Without a doubt I had the best time in the Craigiebield I had in the 10 weeks I slouched around the old countries. There's something about the breakfast (eggs, sausage, black pudding, beans, scone, tomato, all the cereal you can eat, fruit, juice, burp) that gets you up in the morning if not out the door afterwards (hard to move).

I spent the time walking up the River North Esk to Penicuik House, in Milton Bridge and Glencorse, Roslin, the Pentlands, and Auld Reekie - which doesn't seem to reek much anymore.

The rub: It's reasonably priced, well-staffed, well-stocked, within reach of Edinburgh, plenty to see on foot in the countryside.

The haggis is good. Try the "appetizer" if you're not sure, but you'll enjoy it no problem, and the salmon, and the sticky pudding (if it's too sticky send it back)!

Ask for Alan, he'll take care of you, and he'll call you "sir" to boot, silly man.

If you go to Roslin the Carrot soup is good at the "Old Original" Roslin Inn. BIG coal fire too as it will probably be raining.

The bus for Edinburgh stops right outside the Craigiebield or you can walk to the main drag and catch a different one. No biggy. 1 pound.

The rooms? Warm, comfortable, clean, enormous tubs, shortcake (bribe the cleaner for extra), TV (BBC gardening shows and football), BUT if you want quiet take a room in the old part; the rooms in the new part are over the well-used function room. Not so bad really as the activity will force you down to the bar with all those single malts.

*sigh*

We stayed just a single night in the hotel.

The Craigiebield House Hotel has obviously undergone renovation recently and so the rooms in the hotel and the general bar / restaurant area are ok. However the cleanliness of our room left a lot to be desired. The carpet was covered in hair, the toilet dirty and the dirty duvet could be seen through the cover. To be fair we were offerred the keys to another room but that was equally dirty except the duvet so we just took the duvet to our original room.

The food in the hotel was ok but the service average at best. I got the impression the staff would rather have been elsewhere.

Given that a fair bit of money has been spent on the hotel in recent years it is dissapointing that the same investment has not been made in the staff.

The Craigiebield House Hotel will never be a 5 star hotel but if they can work on the customer service it might be an ok place to stay a night or two.

The Swallow Craigiebield House Hotel was great! The hotel staff was always kind and extremely helpful. The room was very clean and shower was excellent. The room was a bit small but my husband and I had so much fun that it did not matter. There was a breakfast included on our stay and it was excellent (your choice of a hot breakfast or continental). There was free parking at the hotel and we took a 30 minute bus ride down to the center of Edinburgh. It was lots of fun and I truly recommend this hotel for the fabulous views outside the hotel and the excellent service we received from the staff.