De l'Etang

The plus points of the hotel: The hotel was clean and the bed was comfortable. We had a nice view from the window. The breakfast was substantial. The negative points: The lack of parking was a real issue, the nearest parking on our arrival was in Green Street car park which is a 10 minute walk away, not great when its pouring with rain. The nearer car park was completely full. We saw very little of the staff other than the ladies who served breakfast, and when we did see them they were unhelpful (not the breakfast ladies). I dropped my wife near the door with our case and went to the car park, the person on reception (who was having a cigarette break outside) offered no help with the case even though he could see my wife was struggling. He just gave her the key and the room number and left her to get on with it. The room was disappointing, the tiny bathroom contained the toilet and shower, with the sink in the bedroom which was very inconvenient. The room was also very noisy from early in the morning, on our first morning the dustmen arrived at 5.40am and made a great deal of noise emptying the bins, on the subsequent morning the traffic noise started at around 6.30am. The breakfast was substantial but much of it had been cooked and kept hot (the bacon particularly was dried up). As I think other reviewers have mentioned, orange juice is pre-poured into a small glass and left out on the table for when guests arrive. It would have been nice to be able to be able to refill the glass. Toast was provided at the same time the tea/coffee arrived, which meant it was cold by the time the breakfast arrived. We actually checked out a day early as we were celebrating our wedding anniversary during our stay and decided we would enjoy it more elsewhere. We packed up around lunchtime and then looked around for a member of staff to check out with, we called out, stood around for about 10 minutes before finally writing a note to say we had checked out leaving this on the bar with our key. Disturbingly we noticed that behind the bar was a basket with all the room keys, not exactly great security.

This is a relatively low cost place to stay in Jersey. It has some good points, and some not so good. On the good side: It is very very clean. The food is excellent. The chef is very good - not only as a chef, but also he is keen to ensure everyone is happy. His breakfast was outstanding. The location is great - right on the seafront. We had a seaview room. On the not so good side: It is very much like an old fashioned B&B. We had a bathroom with a shower and toilet, but the wash basin was in the bedroom! Service at dinner was chaotic and impersonal. Late drinkers (including staff I think) on the terrace were quite noisy. Finally: We asked that a member us staff book us a 645 taxi to the airport. What arrived was a vehicle from Panda cars. It was the scruffiest oldest car I have been in. It had no meter and the price felt like a ripoff £30+ for 10 minute drive. As I say at the start, (apart from the taxi) you have to balance the good with the less good and take the price into account.

We stayed for 3 nights on the 2nd floor. Room was sea facing and the size was fine for the time spent in it. The toilet and shower was small as expected in a b and b. The bed was comfy and towels replaced daily. We had a meal in the Greek taverna which was lovely and the full English breakfast was very nice and kept us going for a while. We caught the no1 bus both ways which was very regular and also walked into St Helier in about half hour. All in all we enjoyed our stay there.