Garden Cottage

The Cottage is lovely.

Very roomy for the 7 of us. All the facilities needed. Hot tub wonderful. Location idealic, lovely surroundings and only five miles to Doncaster town centre. The girls had a wonderful 2 nights away.

The cottage needs a good clean.

Chips and dust under the settee in the living room. But thick dust on all the ornaments. Lack of crockery, 4 mugs for 8 people and 1 breakfast bowl. We had to unblock an upstairs toilet on arrival, and a tap was loose. Beds were very comfortable. The aga was great.

THIS IS A REVIEW OF THE PROPERTY, NOT SYKES COTTAGES AS A COMPANY.

We have been very happy with the service and quality of accommodation we have stayed in via Sykes Cottages.... up until our last stay at Garden Cottage, Loversall, Doncaster. The location of Garden Cottage is first-class - easy to access via major routes, yet enjoying a real 'get-away-from-it-all' feeling and exactly as described. The property, unfortunately, was a different matter - in fact, I contacted Sykes via live-chat on the first evening of our arrival (Sunday 31st August) to advise that we intended to leave the following morning! We did, however, decide to give the property the benefit of the doubt, in case we had acted hastily, and remained - returning home, in the end after only 4 nights instead of 5! Upon arrival, we had to empty the dishwasher, which was packed full with crockery and frying pans. Several items had to be washed again as they still had quite copious amounts of food residue on them. Quite a few of the plates/mugs were chipped and there were not enough mugs for 8 people, should the place be fully occupied. The instructions for the Aga (supposedly in the back of the information pack) were nowhere to be found and it transpired that, should you wish to use the washing machine or tumble drier, you had to ask for access to the 'second utility room'. A warning in case of power cuts and instructions on how to reset the fuse box (above the eye-level cupboards) suggested the use of a small stool to stand on. There was no torch to hand 'in case' of need. We did have to reset the fuse board and it was necessary for me to climb up onto the worktop to access the switches. I am an average 5' 6'' in height and 70 years old! Sleepers, that were used to form a seating patio area outside the sun-room, literally 'see-sawed' when you stood on either end and the summer house didn't appear to have been cleaned for months. Several light-bulbs were missing from the fittings around the house and there were no plugs in two of the wash basins in the bathroom and ensuite. The small bin in the master en-suite was still full as it hadn't been emptied and, I suspected, smelt - as did the master bedroom. However, in the end I convinced myself it was because it was an old property. It took us a while to locate the light switch in the master ensuite shower room. In the end, we found a very short, broken light pull that had been knotted twice at the end. It had obviously been like that for some time as the end was discoloured with use. We did alert the owner to this and the response was, "thanks for letting me know". No-one came to fix it during the duration of our stay. We are familiar with the 'quirks' of old properties but that does not excuse/explain sloppy housekeeping or Health and Safety issues. By the middle of the week we decided that our stay was causing more stress than relaxation (for my husband's 80th birthday treat!) so we set about packing up to leave on Thursday 4th September, instead of the following day. I pride myself on leaving properties as clean and tidy as when I arrive but I could not sweep or vacuum the floors as there was not even a dustpan and brush available! The final straw - when emptying the bathroom bin that we had been left by previous occupants, into the rubbish to be bagged up and put into the outside bins, it uncovered a used sanitary item in the bottom! So I certainly hadn't 'imagined' the smell! Couldn't get away quick enough!! Please be alerted, Sykes, as this property certainly does not live up to usually high standards. I think the expression is, "all Top Show!" We were extremely disappointed as the break was supposed to celebrate a special occasion. I can certainly think of better ways of spending over a £1000!! I did receive a prompt reply to my initial email with yourselves (31st August) on 1st September , giving me a named contact (Louis) but was unable to reply as I was not sure how to use the WhatsApp method requested.