Hilldale Retreat

- Hotel owner was very responsive in the comms before arrival - very good swimming pool, kids loved it - very spacious room with great view - pool and hockey tables for kids to play - high quality food at the restaurant, very delicious

- The price is quite high compared to other hotels in the area. - Housekeeping felt unnecessarily restrictive. We were 4 guests, but the room was replenished with only 2 tea bags and 2 water bottles per day. In hotels at this price level, guests usually expect a more generous standard. At checkout, extra water bottles were added to the bill, which I disputed and the owner eventually removed. For a hotel in this price range, trying to save money on basic items like tea bags and water leaves a poor impression - Restaurant service was extremely slow, despite the hotel having only 2 occupied rooms at the time. - We also experienced a very uncomfortable and unprofessional situation with one of the staff members. He apparently told our driver that I had questioned why they served him breakfast, which was completely untrue. The only thing I did was clarify whether his breakfast would be charged to us after they asked me what he would like to eat. Similar uncomfortable moment happened when we were leaving: the driver waited while a staff member checked the room, and the staff member shook his head “no” to the driver from the balcony before coming downstairs, after which our driver tipped him (!). It gave the impression that the staff member was checking whether we had left tips and communicating this to the driver. Our driver became upset after these 2 cases and only told us about it when we left the hotel. He mentioned that hotel staff had been discussing us with him and how our nationality behave. I found this very shocking and unprofessional from the hotel to discuss guests with the driver, and unfortunately it negatively affected our relationship with the driver for the rest of the trip, he kept repeating "now I know who you are".

Everything

Nothing

Lovely view , nice rooms, good breakfast

Price is quite high compared and the pool is pretty cold.

A lovely hotel with a really great pool enjoying views for miles. Food was delicious and rooms were really comfy.

It's not close to Nuwara Eliya - and because trains are limited after Cyclone Ditwa, the taxi journey from the hotel to Ambewela is over an hour - you may prefer to stay the other side of Nuwara Eliya to minimise this.