Great Western Hotel

This hotel has a lovely bar restaurant, open to the public, Steam, with some of the finest panoramic views in town. Generally well-staffed with good friendly service, it is comfortable and expansive. The bar is well stocked with the usual St. Austell range and standard managed house menu and I found both food and drinks to be good. Sadly, however, my enjoyment of the bar restaurant was not matched by my dark single room overlooking the bin store with little natural light and dim room lighting. Whilst the bed was comfortable, this was probably the noisiest room I have stayed in. The thin partition walls provided no noise insulation from the corridors which seemed busy from around 6am to the small hours. This coupled with noisy bin emptying (soon after 6am!) on two days, reversing horns blaring, and bright blue lights on the electric radiator and heated towel rail controls led to disturbed sleeping. Less annoying, but mildly irritating, was the lack of sufficient plug sockets and an easy chair. Based on this one experience, I would stay elsewhere but certainly use the Steam bar and restaurant!

We have just returned from a week’s stay at this hotel. Good Points Friendly staff. Marvellous location with brilliant views, book a room with a sea view. A handy bus stop right outside the hotel. We used our bus pass to get around as we flew down. Breakfast was mainly good. Our room was kept clean by the hardworking staff. Bad Points Exterior is badly in need of painting. The building looks derelict and not at all inviting. This hotel is the oldest in Newquay. There is new competition from The Nicu which replaced the old Victoria Hotel. This hotel needs to up its facilities. Some bedrooms have been renovated but the public area looks very tired. Tables and chairs in the restaurant area need replacing. Please replace your condiments! People want to see HP Brown Sauce, Hellmann’s Mayonnaise, not a cheap, awful, watery, grotesquely coloured replacement. There were lots of foreign guests, I know they like to eat cold meats and cheeses for breakfast. I didn’t see any provided. More fresh fruit is needed. See picture for the lack of space in our sea front bedroom. We enjoyed our stay. We have lived in Newquay and like to revisit annually. We may decide to stay elsewhere next year. The Great Western is quite expensive for the facilities provided.

Just returned from a short but sweet stay at the Great Western Newquay at the beginning of September. Having stayed previously, i generally knew what to expect, although this time it was apparent that the wear and tear of many busy summers had really caught up with the place and it is all in need of a serious refurbishment. The public areas such as the stairwells, corridors and reception areas in particular are like a throwback to decades past and not necessarily in a good way. Location: For us the location is great and has to to be the hotels biggest selling points. There are many rooms that will have sea views, as well as the bar and restaurant areas all having great views too. The hotel is just far enough away from some of the more "lively" parts of Newquay, that if you end up with a road side room at the front of the hotel, theres less chance you'll be disturbed than some other hotels a little further down. It's also close enough to plenty of other eating areas and a short walk to the town centre to not be considered ti be "out of the way" in any shape or form and ofcourse minutes from both Great Western and Tolcarn beaches. Furthermore there is a bus stop directly outside the front of the property with services towards Padstow, Newquay Airport, St Austell and Truro. Additionally, Newquay railway station is just a 2 minute walk over the road as well! Room: We stayed in a sea view room overlooking the Great Western beach. The views are of course delightful. The room itself was quite large, very clean and although well kept, it was extremely tired and dated now. The bed was extremely comfortable and shower lovely and hot and nice and powerful. I am aware there is a room upgrade programme ongoing as we had a peak inside our friends room who was staying in one. They looked lovely, albeit no one was a fan of wooden floors. Simply not fit for a hotel! Breakfast: We chose to have breakfast included within our room package. It was lovely to have the option to help yourself to cereals, toast, pastries, yoghurt, juices etc whilst having a hot option cooked fresh for you. This hot breakfast was also lovely. There were Vegan and gluten free options available too. Overall i would recommend choosing the breakfast option if staying here and i would do so again. My only personal suggestion to improve the experience, would be if a none dairy milk alternative was readily available. If that's not possible, instead perhaps have a notice to suggest to request it from the bar area. I'm sure if people asked there'd be a possibility, but some people don't always feel comfortable in asking, so little prompts to make it look like its ok to do so are always welcome. Staff: Upon arrival late in the evening the staff on reception were friendly although not instantly warmly welcoming, despite it not being busy it at all. For me, a warm welcome can often make you ignore minor issues that you may otherwise end up noticing such as tired and worn decor. That being said, they seemed to encounter an inital issue finding myself in their system, but itbwas however soon resolved and we had our room key and were on our way. Staff in the breakfast room were again friendly enough although not initially warm and welcoming. Our booking wasn't initially visible on the paperwork and although it was later found and we had a laugh about it, perhaps a clearer system needs setting up for the staff welcoming guests into breakfast. Overall: I would genuinely recommend staying here. So long as you're able overlook the worn out appearance, want a great location and are able to find a suitable price! I have rated it 4 due to taking into account the current condition of the unrefurbished room as well as the appearance of the rest of the public areas of the hotel. Due to this, i feel the price we paid was a little steep. We were happy to pay a little more to guarantee a sea view room (it's just something we enjoy treating ourselves to if its not too much more), but the current pricing, especially for a midweek date could be a little lower, particularly if booking into a unrefurbished room. As I have stayed in much higher standard hotels for significantly less within a similar type setting, i feel this is a very fair review. I would love to come back sometimr soon and try a refurbished room for ourselves. It would be great to see the beautiful building shining back in all her former glory too. It really must be a flagship location of the owners and they need to invest in it.