Crown and Castle

My wife and I booked two rooms at the Crown and Castle, for a short break with my son and his girlfriend last summer (sorry, I'm a bit late with the review) The hotel is charmingly situated right next to Orford castle, in the centre of the picturesque village, and a short walk from the harbour. We booked a deluxe village and superior sea view rooms. Our room, the deluxe village room, was very spacious, beautifully furnished in light colours, and had a great view of the village square and church in one direction and the castle in the other. My sons room was equally good and, as the description said, had a great view of the river estuary out to sea. We had booked on a dinner, bed and breakfast basis, so we had a chance to sample the food in the restaurant. Our meals were excellent. A lovely dinner menu to choose from and an equally good selection at breakfast (full English for me!). All in all, we had a great short break at this delightful hotel and will definitely return. Great location, friendly service, good food. Highly recommended.

Highly recommend this lovely restaurant with rooms. Wonderful dinner and breakfast served by efficient and friendly staff all under leadership of John who was an exceptional manager. Very comfortable quiet, boutique rooms with some lovely personal touches. Beautiful village with gorgeous walks on the doorstep taking in amazing views and wildlife.

As always, I'm really happy when any hotel provides an insulated bottle of fresh milk and not plastic pots or sachets of UHT milk for in room tea. We were very glad of the fan in the room as the weather was quite muggy. The bed was comfy (I liked the pillows) though the in room wi-fi was on the slow side. While the Crown & Castle has a car park at the rear, there is very limited room for maneouvre - we were concerned that if we managed to park in one of the spaces, if another car parked next to us, we'd never get out again given our car's relatively poor turning circle and the narrow passage in front of the garden rooms. We gave up on attempting to use the hotel car park and found a space in the village square a minute along the rood. The Crown and Castle staff provide excellent service - attentive but not intrusive. The sort of hospitality which is not as common as it should be. The drinks menu had plenty of wines by the glass, with suggestions on the food menu as to which would go well with the various dishes on offer, as well as interesting aperitifs e.g. Lillet. Good to see the local Adnams gins on the drinks menu. Given that the Crown and Castle is known as a bit of a foodie destination we were a little disappointed with a couple of aspects of our dinner the one night we dined there. My husband said his piece of pork was rather bland (though the black pudding also on the plate as part of the dish was very tasty). I had a sea bass dish - the fish was very well cooked, though I was a little surprised that the charred cauliflower component was quite as raw crunchy as it was. For dessert I ordered what was advertised as a hazelnut delice with hazelnut cremeux. The delice was definitely more chocolate than hazelnut in flavour, though the hazelnut cremeux and crunchy nuts on the side were very welcome. The dessert was a bit on the sweet side and would have benefitted from a zingy sharper component to balance. Breakfast was good but not outstanding. Tasty cloudy apple juice. The fruit compote served with yoghurt was not quite what I expected (made with dried apricots and raisins, rather than the usual berry mixture) but the yoghurt was rich and creamy. Home made "Tuscan beans" rather than your regular baked beans as part of the full English menu (or as an alternative to the full fry up).