In spite of marketing this Hotel as "Near to the family attraction of Chester Zoo" there is absolutely no childrens facilities at the hotel - not even a childrens menu.

A poster by the door states separate areas for smoking but the bar area had smoking throughout so in the evening there was nowhere to sit with our two year old and have a drink, we had to leave the hotel both nights to find somewhere to eat - luckily Cheshre Oaks isn't too far away and has plenty of family restaurants, however it was inconvenient.

Also the hotel placed us in one of the furthest rooms from the entrance meaning we had to push a buggy through miles of corridors & fire doors.

Never Again !!!

My partner and I stayed for two nights at the hotel in March 2005. It was our second visit and we were really looking forward to it as the previous one was excellent. However, we were a little disappointed. We had booked an exectutive room but it was worse than our previous stay. The room was small and a little shabby. Our 'exectutive' extras consisted of some sctatchy towelling bath robes, cheap silppers, some water and a plate of fruit.
The receptionist on arrival was very rude and off hand with everyone, including other staff. She reminded us of Basil Fawlty!
On a better note, the food was good, both breakfast and dinner and usually served well. The rest of the staff were very helpful, and the hotel is in lovely surroundings close to Chester. Despite everything we still had a lovely relaxing break.

The Hoole Hall is a mixture of courtly public space with a pub, atrium/breakfast dining hall, and meeting rooms that service both guests and local groups, mixed with a separate 1980's add-on wing of worn-out private or motel space that reminds one of the Bates Motel. In the public space, the staff generally worked hard to please eg. the service staff of the pub and breakfast area. But the rooms are truly worn, smokey and the bathroom was moldy with a ventilation fan that screeched like a screech owl and had not been cleaned since the 1980's renovation. Furthermore, we had booked a room through a travel agent at a particular price. At Checkout, they doubled the price and insisted they never would have booked one at the price we had on our itinerary. Because there is an 8 hour time difference our travel agent was closed when they tried to check this with the agent. The staff insisted on charging us the higher amount. We are still trying to resolve this issue. We met some remarkable folks from Nottingham enjoying a New Year's getaway with a quiet card game in the pub. But international folks beware. You might not get what you paid for. The Corus group should invest in updating this property and acknowledge that the customer is what pays the bills.

Hotel looked lovely from the outside.
However, the ground floor room we were given was next to the female toilets in reception, kept awake most of the night by laughing, shouting and banging doors.
If this wasn't bad enough, upon returning to the room after breakfast the following morning i opened the window and was dismayed to see (and smell) a large pile of what can only be politely described as toilet waste 1m to the left!
We immeidiately informed the duty manager who told us to leave our contact no. and that we would be in touch asap on monday to sort some sort of refund.
That was sunday 12th Dec, i'm writing this at 6pm on monday 13th having recieved no call today.
Not happy at all.