“Our experience of Cabinteely was not great at all.”
My husband and I rented it for 28 nights as we needed somewhere to live in May 2021 as we finalize a house purchase in the Lake District. I also work from home and so the second room was a space where I could put a mobile desk and have some quiet.
To sum up our stay, we checked out after eight nights of trying to make it work for the following reasons.
The internet is abysmal, unreliable, and super slow—download speed of 3Mbs and upload speeds of 0.4Mbs. I had to purchase mobile wifi data at additional expense to be able to keep working.
The gate is a real problem, as you will read in other reviews. It requires brute strength to unclip, and then one has to lift to open and close and drag through the gravel, in our case, mud.
Photos are deceiving. On the photographs, it looks quaint and well-appointed, and it is comfortably appointed. The challenge, however, is it's tiny, dark, and felt rather gloomy.
Granted, we arrived in a cold spell with lots of rain. As such, we relied on the heating. The challenge here is that the owner needs to regulate it for you from his app, so you can only request that and then switch it on or off. Also, the fireplace is old and does not generate much heat nor work adequately.
While we have no issues with the bustle of farm life traffic, the noise was a problem at points. The cottage is also across the road from the local ambulance service. Should they be on call at night, you will hear their sirens.
Unbeknown to us when booking, a massive 40-foot trailer is parked on the road leading to the farmer's property. The trailer is a permanent fixture (we think the farm uses it for storage) and is in your direct view from the kitchen and, notably, the garden. But, unfortunately, it completely blocks out the country views. It's dreadful and unfortunate.
Bed linens and pillows were tired and felt a bit like a hostel bed vs. something a lot more comfortable. We had a terrible sleep all eight nights.
Wallpaper coming off the wall, marks on radiators and window sills, toilet seat loose, various aspects of decorating were not up to scratch.
On the plus side, while we stayed there, the TV broke and was replaced the next day. The caretaker, Steve, and his wife were very helpful and responsive when we needed something or had a question. The kitchen is well equipped despite being tiny.
The whole experience was stressful, so we decided to leave, knowing we had paid upfront. However, following up and citing our reasons, the owners refused to meet us somewhere in the middle and refund even a portion of the unused stay. Instead, they said we should have given them a chance to rectify the issues. Unfortunately, there would be very little they could correct given the list above during our stay, and it would have disturbed the stay had they tried.
It certainly left a sour taste in our mouths. As the staycations are on the rise in a post-pandemic world, it is unfortunate that companies like Sykes and owners like Cabinteely are taking advantage of low supply and high demand so when situations like this occur they are completely inflexible. And, unfortunately, the prices do not represent the value. Cabinteely was certainly not worth the 1,800 GBP they asked for the month's stay. However, we did get our 150 GBP good housekeeping deposit back.
- Mrs Krijger, April 2021
This review stands out amongst the other reviews and I trust other readers will see this review for what it is. For the most part it is highly inaccurate exercise in nit picking that has made mountains out of mole hills in an attempt to get a refund. We are not opposed to refunds we recently refunded a guest who had a family member in hospital.
Lets be clear about the motivation for this review. The customer made a mistake in choosing a property that was not suited to their needs. After booking it for a month they felt it was not suited to them and tried to make us pay for that mistake by requesting a refund.
We refused as it would have been unlikely we would be able to re let those weeks at such short notice. The customer enquired about the Wi-Fi some weeks prior to arrival and did her own research and messaged my wife to say she was happy to go ahead as she felt after her own research it would be fine for her needs.
We have had a jockey wheel for the 5 bar gate ready to fit since the start of the lockdown. As the customer has been living in Dubai she may not be aware that we have been unable to leave our county until recently as we live in Lancashire. However the 5 bar gate while needing attention is by no means impossible to open and close. I am disabled and my wife id 5' 1' and neither of us have a problem operating the gate, though admittedly the jockey wheel will make it a lot easier.
The cottage IS small the guest knew this when they booked. It IS NOT gloomy its well lit and decorated in light colours as the pictures clearly show. I understand that coming from the sunshine of Dubai to a country village in Cumbria must have been a culture shock.
The owner Does Not need to regulate the heating remotely, though we did make some adjustments at the guests request. If the guest had bothered to read the guest hand book they would have found clear instructions on how to operate the heating system.
The fire place IS old the cottage was a farm house built in the 1700s originally. The Highlander Multi Fuel Stove is a well known and respected brand and about 15 years old which was recently serviced. Again instructions on how to operate the stove are in the guest handbook. I suspect they never read this. The stove is larger than that required for the size of house as we wanted it to be able to heat hot water as well. The Guests inability to work the stove is user error, the comments about the stove are simply UNTRUE!
The NHS Ambulance station we can do nothing about but they are not allowed to use their siren until out of the village. I don't believe this has every been raised as an issue by other guests.
Whilst the trailer is not ideal it is outside of our control however to say that it completely blocks the view of the Cumbrian Fells is Again NOT TRUE.
The bed linen is from Dunelm and the Duvet and Pillows are Fogerty and hotel standard. Not sure why they had a terrible sleep all eight nights but I suspect it has nothing to do with the mattress.
Now the nit picking really starts. Reality check:
One tiny corner of wallpaper coming away easily fixed if we had been told.
Small marks on radiators where guests have caught the paint with luggage or shoes.
Small cup mark on lounge windows sill due to guest leaving a spirit glass on it.
Toilet seat loose. First we have heard but easily fixed if we had been told.
Not sure what the vague 'Various aspects of décor not up to scratch means' So again I can only assume that this guests expectations are way in excess of what you would expect from a small cottage in Cumbria and other guests have not mentioned the décor. It was full decorated 3 years ago.
The Kitchen is small but absolutley in keeping with the size of the cottage. The guest knew this and even visited the cottage prior to arrival the size of the kitchen and lounge can be clearly be seen through the windows. Why has this been raised as an issue now?
Sykes owner relations