Afternoon Tea At Careys Manor Senspa

My Husband booked afternoon tea for my Birthday as a surprise. When we arrived there was nobody waiting in the restaurant to greet us. We had to ask the bar man where to go. He sat us in a lounge on a sofa. Perplexed, we asked if we could sit at an actual table as it was a special occasion and a sofa is too low down to eat from (and too casual! He said he would ask someone. About 10 15 minutes went past and a lady appeared and asked us if we were being looked after. We told her we were waiting; she said follow me. We walked past the same bar man who was behind the bar serving drinks! She sat us in the restaurant which only had two occupied tables. By this point 35 minutes had gone by. She said she would get us the teas. They were just tea bags. There was no table cloth and the teapots were stainless steel canteen style. The food arrived and I was surprised at the amount The savouries were a tiny rye bread, a tiny sausage roll and two finger sandwiches each. I’m sorry to say I did not enjoy the food. The cakes tasted artificial and cheap. I actually had to leave parts of them which is extremely unlike me I love cake! The table behind us were also saying they had not enjoyed the cakes. The clotted cream tasted off. The scones were small. The one saving grace was that the female waitress was lovely with our little girl and was good at her job. Nobody mentioned my Birthday despite my Husband making a note of it on the booking. At the end of this experience we sat waiting for somebody to come to our table for quite some time. Unfortunately I had to leave the room to go to the bar to ask the bar man if somebody could take our payment. The bill came and I was absolutely in shock to see that on top of the charge for food £28pp, they had added VAT as well as a 12.5% service charge! My Husband did not want to make a scene so he paid it. I was not best pleased. An awful lot here that needs to be improved!

Afternoon tea. The sandwiches, scones and cakes were lovely, plenty of cream and jam and a pot of tea each and although not offered any more tea during the afternoon, one pot was plenty. I did find it disappointing that they use hospital grade thick white china crockery and stainless steel teapots I was expecting some pretty patterned bone china considering the venue. Also, when we tried to add two extra people to our booking of 5, the lady was quite abrupt and told us they were fully booked. Fortunately we tried again the next day and were told there was no problem to add extra guests and in fact a good two thirds of the tables were unoccupied, so management may want to look into that.

This afternoon tea was a Christmas gift for my Mum. When we arrived, we struggled a bit to find the reception and when we eventually did, we were taken to a nice cosy room but quickly prompted to move to a big room with huge empty space in the middle and a wooden table which had a box of teas on display. Quite a few tables were taken but there was a strange atmosphere there and very strange music playing in the background. When we looked closely at our crockery and cutlery, this was not only mismatched but also very dirty! And so were the seats! We waited about 20 minutes for the food to arrive and it was quite disappointing too. Not sure why afternoon tea is not being served in that nice cosy room next to the restaurant. The service was prompt and the waitresses were very polite but overall I expected a bit more from a beautiful place like this.

What a weird set up this hotel has ! Finally managed to find a place to park the car and then no signage to where reception was . After walking about we Found a sign that very weirdly took us through 2 long corridors of hotel rooms to the back entrance to main reception. Very strange. I would definitely not want to stay there knowing anyone can walk past your room . so absolutely zero security . Was shown into restaurant area where we had booked afternoon tea . Very dated . Spacious though . No garden views at all infact all we looked at were other tables and a wall . Not what I thought at all. Food was fresh and service good . Overall I was disappointed. It was totally not what I expected and I was surprised at how dated the hotel was . Such a shame as I have only heard good things about the hotel and spa . Shame

Beautiful venue, wonderful staff and a delicious afternoon tea. Lovely sandwiches, fresh scones and gorgeous dainty cakes. A wide selection of teas with unlimited refills. Staff were happy for us to light birthday cake candles and sing! A relaxed atmosphere and we will definitely come back.