Really great find

A fantastic hotel, with really helpful staff and a cracking restaurant. Nice clean room and well lokked after.

Unhelpful

We were put on the 4 th floor although we are in our mid seventies and alternative room was only offered when we had unpacked
The dining room lacked any ambiance with its plastic tables and loud music .Only 6 tables were in use.
The menu was very limited - not as good as many pubs.Sticky rice on the menu turned out to be ordinary rice
A special weekend ruined by our staying

Bowden Hall

The Hotel had an upgrade in 2016. This was our first visit since then because OPL had to change our booking at the last minute as our initial choice (Wyck House near Stow on the Wold) could not offer a restaurant service. The upgrade has lasted reasonably well and although partial has improved the decor in many of the more visible public spaces.
The bedroom we stayed in was a mixture of modern and outdated and worn 'old' furniture suggesting upgrading the hotel will take place over time but although the room had no view other than the steep bank immediately outside the window on the back of the hotel the room was comfortable and more than adequate.
The front of house team were great ambassadors for Mercure - friendly; informative as were the restaurant staff we had contact with.
The hotel enjoys a fine site overlooking a lake and the addition of 3 dining pods might be a nice experience to try in the lighter nights.
The breakfasts were high quality and varied and well served.. Its easy to understand why in these times any hotel cannot currently offer a wide choice in a dinner menu (or any restaurant service at all in the case of Wyck House) but I recollect that the rather limited choice in the hotel's offering was one of the reasons we did not go back to Bowden Hall after having been there a few times before 2016. It seemed difficult to avoid masses of chips with the choices we actually could make. What we had is best classed as 'Pub Grub' and not of comparable quality/choice to the other hotels in a similar price bracket we've stayed in the the Cotswolds.
We felt the wine list to be off puttingly expensive for what was on offer. A 500% mark up or similar is likely to prove the law of diminishing returns although this comment could unfortunately be made about the wine offerings in many of the other Hotels we've stayed in.
The OPL offering at this Hotel is a 'nice to have'. For a first visit to the area the Hotel and location have much to commend it and its unlikely one would be dissatisfied.
For us, having been a number of times its time to look for something different.

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Nice breakfast, not very warm, evening meal small portions

Mid wk 3 night stay with friends

Staff very welcoming and helpful.Food was very good but same menus every night .Rooms were of a good size very clean bath rooms also good size very clean with a bath and shower

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