I have recently been to the Lovat hotel - just last week in fact. Once I got there I liked it, even though it was a bit basic. However, that was just the reception. There were some very nice staff and were more than happy to accept another last-minute traveller. By the time we got checked in, it was around 11:00pm as our boat only came in at about 8:30. We arrived in our room, to find that someone had been smoking, even though we had been assured on the phone that it was a non-smoking, because the smoking ban had been enforced. I wouldn't mind if it was only a little waft of smoke now and then. But the room had been smoked in longer than just a day or two as everything you touched seemed to breathe out smoke! I would have gone to the reception and got a different room, but we had an elderly woman with us who had walking difficulties, and we didn't want to have to drag her up a set of stairs three or four times a day. Once we were in the room for a little while, you seemed to get used to it.

Finally, after all that trauma, you'd think getting into your nice, clean, cosy bed would be so lovely, right? Wrong! Every turn that I made in my bed, I got a great big whiff of smoke right up my nose. What's more, we weren't even told what time breakfast was at, so we rang the reception 3 times and no one answered. This is a hotel which can be open all night for weddings and it was only 11pm!

Next morning, we went to the restaurant. Good enough, could have been better. They weren't that attentive, i thought. That is until I saw that some of the staff were having their breakfast. They had completely forgotten about our breakfasts. Not even an apology. At the reception I asked why we didn't know about breakfast and they said that it was in the room in the guest information book - which we didn't have. Yet another thing we weren't told about!

To forget about all our troubles we went to bed and turned on the TV. The remote didn't change the volume, yet other buttons work. Obviously this room was meant for deaf people as the volume was turned down so low you couldn't even hear it!

Overall I was totally let down by the Lovat. I chose it because it was a hotel and the website pictures looked good. Obviously those are about 20 years old. I think it would have been better if we had stayed in the Holiday Inn! I'm going somewhere far far away from there on my next trip to Perth!