HotelMill House

[koshkha, 17.06.2008] I stayed at the Mill House recently and was simultaneously impressed and depressed by what I found. I liked my room, which was exceptionally pretty and I liked the setting but the food was poor, the service ‘patchy and the public areas just a bit too much like a 1980s country pub with no customers.

Location
The hotel is in the tiny village of Ashington, about ten miles north of Worthing and just off the A24. If you don't know its there, you'll struggle to find it as its located down a pot-holed track off a poorly sign-posted side-road to the dual carriageway. Luckily someone led me to the right road as I think it would have been very easy to miss.

First Impressions
First impressions were that it looked very pretty, rural and twee but on closer inspection the rather verdant gardens were a bit too overgrown - beyond the level of the intentionally sewn ‘wildflower meadow look and veering towards almost as weedy as my garden. There are two car parks and I pulled into the first but it was so badly laid out that I really worried about my car being hit by another guest and I actually went out and moved it to the second car park after dinner.

Heading to reception, I was impressed again by the Johanssens sign on the door their guidebooks are usually a guarantee of quality so I swung back from thinking ‘a bit messy' to ‘hmm, maybe this is something special' but swung back again after several minutes trying to work out how the heck I was supposed to check in when there was no sign of human life. I left my bags in the lobby and blundered about until I found a very nice girl with zany eye-shadow who checked me in and led me up to my room, telling me to let her know if I wanted dinner or some sandwiches later in the evening.

My Room
The hotel has just nine rooms and they are named rather than numbered. Mine was called ‘Barley' so I guess its a fair bet that the others have similarly crop-inspired names. It was on the side of the house, overlooking the lane and benefited from having windows on the two exterior walls which - since it was a sunny June day - lit the room so that it almost glowed. The room was L-shaped with a tiny en-suite and this shape meant the only way the four-poster bed could be fitted in was at 45-degrees across the middle of the room. This was quirky rather than annoying. The colour scheme was fresh and pretty in pale blue and white with toile de jouy wallpaper on several walls - a look that was very trendy a couple of years ago, will probably be extremely dated in a few more but for now, looks very nice. The blues of the pattern were picked out in the pale blue bedspread and mound of pillows on the bed, the matching over-long curtains and the old and slightly shabby blue carpet.

The paintwork was all bright and white with a large painted chest of drawers, a giant white wardrobe with a massive mirror front, and an alcove with coffee tray and a white fret-work fronted 'something or other' below (it looked like a radiator cover but I didn't inspect too closely). Each side of the bed had a white painted bedside table and a lamp. There was an uncomfortable-looking boudoir chair, a large trouser press and a folding suitcase stand.

The TV was very small and tucked into a corner of the chest of drawers where it was quite hard to see and there was no remote control. The hairdryer was wall mounted and next to the tea tray with a mirror behind I cannot think why anyone would want to crouch over the tea-tray to dry their hair when a mirror on the wall above the hairdryer would have been a much better layout. The bathroom was disappointing, being little bigger than the wardrobe and very squeezed together. There was a loo, sink and shower all in the absolute minimum amount of space.

Back to the bed it was a standard sized double and gave the impression of a cheap four-poster that had been dressed up quite nicely with plenty of white gauze. A bit of a 'teen-dream princess' look that might well irritate the heck out of a male guest but I quite liked it. The bedding was sheets-and-blanket which I find quite bizarre and the pale blue quilt/bedspread was quite thin.

Good news for business travellers - free wi-fi! All you have to do is hunt down the nice lady with the eye-shadow and the pigtails to get the code number for access. The signal was good and with little else to do in the area, it kept me busy for the evening.

The Rest of the Hotel
If I were being kind (well, slightly kind) I could say its a bit dull or drab. If I was trying to say something in its defence, I could call it ‘retro' but its hard to dress up the fact that its actually just a bit old and shabby. There are a couple of small lounge areas that reminded me of an old people's home (with chairs arranged round the walls) or a neglected old pub. The bar area has a fantastic old inglenook fireplace that could be made into a nice feature but has instead gone a bit too much in the ‘old-brass and nick-nacks' direction. The restaurant is large, allegedly well respected but decorated with just too many 1980s-style nudes. Sorry guys but I'm there to eat, not look at bad nudes - it really was quite distracting, even more so at breakfast time.

They have a meeting room on the back of the hotel that seems to be popular and was used by at least two different groups whilst I was there (which was only one over-night stay). There's a very pretty outside terrace but it wasn't quite warm enough to use when I visited.

The Restaurant
I went down to order some dinner at about 7.20 pm. As before, it took a while to find any sign of human life other than a retired couple sitting on the sofas in the bar ignoring each other. I went into the garden and out to wander around for ten minutes before coming back again and eventually finding eye-shadow girl. I ordered a juice and sat in the bar area. I asked the waitress if she could find me a magazine or a newspaper or something to read but after ten minutes she returned to say she asked the manager and they didn't have anything. OK, so I'll sit here in silence and wait another twenty minutes for you to take my order.

The menu was not particularly exciting but the prices were quite expensive. Two courses for £24 or so, three for a couple of pound more. I ordered a chilli prawn starter and a tuna steak with ‘wok-fried noodles to follow.

Time to eat and I was led into a corner of the restaurant. As the place was so empty, it would have been nice to have been offered a choice of where I could sit but I was just taken to a small table and left there. It might have been nice to have had the option of eating in the conservatory.

My starter came with a basket of bread which was one of the best bits of the meal. The chilli prawns were simple but pleasant - I wasn't impressed by the creativity but I enjoyed the dish. Waiting for the tuna I did start to think that it probably hadnt been a good choice. Tuna has to be really fresh and I couldnt imagine that a restaurant with so few customers would be buying fresh every day. I should also have twigged that there might be a problem when the waitress didn't ask how I wanted it - always a sign that I'll get it the way it comes which if it's been rapidly thawed in a microwave means any sign of pink is unlikely.

When it came, I wondered if it was actually from a whale rather than a tuna because it was so enormous. It was much too thick, rather tough and stringy in places, smelled slightly ‘off and had too many of those dark bits that you know will taste just a bit too fishy. The ‘wok-fried' noodles looked like the stuff students make when trying to dress up a packet of 19p economy noodles. The only good thing was the tray of vegetables which included some very nice little roasted baby potatoes and some broccoli. The vegetables weren't matched in anyway to the dish but at least they distracted from the tuna.

Breakfast
Breakfast the next morning was in the conservatory and the lady serving was very nice. She brought me coffee and whipped up a nice vegetarian breakfast that was not too big to make me feel guilty for the rest of the day, but was just enough to fill me up.

Check Out
This was quick and easy. My bill had been prepared in advance, all typed up nicely on paper with a picture of the hotel. I paid by credit card, asked for instructions to get back to the dual carriageway, and was on my way. My room was £59 for the night which I thought was great value although double occupancy would have been a lot more. So if you need a nice little country hotel, this might be a good choice but dont use the restaurant. I should have followed my instinct and driven down to the sea for fish and chips out of newspaper.