Riverview (Alnmouth), Alnmouth

The house is spacious, comfortable and well equipped for a family selfcatering holiday. There is not very much work surface for food preparation in the kitchen. Also the drawers were rather annoying. Sometime they were reluctant to open and sometimes refused to stay shut. Also we could not find a bottle opener. The beach is within easy walking distance of the house. It has rock pools and sand, and plenty of space for dogs to run about. There is a village shop close by, and several supermarkets near Alnwick, 12 minutes away by car.

We were a group of seven adults aged 19 to 82 years and Riverview Alnmouth was a perfect holiday cottage for us. Lots of room! Easy access to the beautiful Northumbrian coastline with its lovely beaches and castles.

The only negative is the instructions regarding key safe. Its very confusing there are two key safes outside and the 2nd one you eventually come to, the one with the keys for the front door, is hidden behind foliage so we couldnt find it for ages! In the pouring rain with two young children it wasnt very fun.

Having seen quite a few negative reviews I was really worried this was a family get together for my son's wedding so really wanted it to be right. So relieved when everything was in order and it was perfect for our family. A couple of things for the owner to be aware off the rechargeable blind in the lounge area needed charging and could not be used whilst we were there. For future occupants take spare toilet roll as only one supplied in each Bathroom! Also no cupboard space for any food that you take and we were lucky that we had taken a large cardboard box which we used for the duration. Other than these points it was great and perfect for our family reunion.

We enjoyed our week at Riverview. The house was spotlessly clean and in a good position near the river and estuary. We had an issue when we arrived when as soon as we unlocked the door the burglar alarm went off and we didnt have a code to stop it. Eventually we managed to contact the agent who arranged for it to be switched off remotely. Our main grumble was the lack of space to store our provisions for the week for ten of us. There was almost no spare cupboard space, even with the small kitchen downstairs, and limited work surfaces for food preparation. It is difficult to see how this could be rectified however, given the modern layout of the kitchen area. Over all we had an enjoyable week in Alnmouth and hope to be back.

Overall we thoroughly enjoyed our break. The property is in a perfect location. It is clean, comfortable and spacious. However the lock box instructions are unclear especially as the one containing the key is obscured by foliage. There is a second key box beside the hot tub which we tried in vain to open resulting in a call to the office and a maintenance man being called out. This delayed our entrance by an hour to six oclock The freezer needs defrosting. The bottom shelf is full of stuck together ice cubes and the top shelf door is broken and doesnt fit because of frost build up.

We found the house very good having been made anxious on reading a poor review just prior to our stay. There was a very good response to my query about this review. The only thing lacking was a bread knife! A comment might be that there might be a table tennis tablesnooker table in the sun room for when it rains.

On arrival the property clearly hadn't been cleaned properly or checked prior to our arrival as there were decorations from a previous occupant left behind. The hot water didn't work and wasn't sorted until late on the second day which meant we all had to have ice cold showers. Customer service has been terrible as after reporting our complaint we never heard back from Sykes, we had to keep chasing. We weren't offered any apology or feedback to our complaint. We were only there 3 nights and paid 250 for the hot tub as could only have if we paid for the week. No one came to clean or maintain while we were there. I would have expected someone to come and maintain it for the price we paid!

Generally very clean, well presented, spacious and comfortable. Well situated for the beach and village. 3 things to note Listing states there is a log fire with initial fuel provided. There is no logburning fire it is a gas stove. We brought logs and had to take them back home. The microwave in the kitchen was working but not revolving this might just have been down to user error but should be looked at to see if it is a fault. There should be some smaller saucepans for the hob, only one huge doublehandled one and one other one supplied.

Lovely house, kitchen area is limited for cooking for a lot of people but looking at the photos we sort of expected that. One of the drawers needs fixing. The ensuite downstairs had a strong drain smell when the upstairs were using their bathrooms. We were a group of photographers wearing waterproofs and boots, there was limited space to hang coats and somewhere to sit in the hall to put on boots would have been useful. Otherwise a good holiday property....thanks

We had a wonderful time staying at riverview, very impressed

. It was disappointing to arrive at 5pm which is a very late checkin time to find the house hadn't been cleaned. We then tried calling the numbers on our booking form one of which was out of order and the other was to a lady who no longer serviced the house . We had to search for another number to contact somebody and then arrange for a cleaner to come urgently. This meant we could not unpack or go shopping, as had been planned. We were told to go out for a meal and charge this to Northumberland Coast and Country Cottages, which was helpful. However, we then had to use the Sunday morning to go shopping and felt we had lost a night and morning of our holiday time. The cleaners did a good job of making the beds and bathrooms clean and tidy, but the general cleanliness of the house was below standard. There was dust under beds, on the stairs, old socks and cloths behind bedside cabinets and furniture. The dishwasher needed a deep clean as the dishes smelled terrible so we had to handwash all of the dishes which for 10 people was a lot of work. There were baby cotshighchairspotties all over the house, with nowhere to store them out of the way. The wardrobes in the master bedroom were filled with boxes and bags so there was very little room to hang clothes, and most of the wardrobes in the bedrooms didn't have hangers so clothes had to folded and put wherever there was space. The outside area was full of cobwebs and the artificial grass had debris all over it which considering this is the first impression of the house was really disappointing. We ended up sweeping and cleaning and hoovering so that the house was clean for our guests who we had invited to share the time with us. I am still waiting for the reimbursement of our meal and the housekeeping bond, so will need to take time today to contact the company again, as I would have thought this would have been dealt with by now. Overall, I have paid nearly 3,500 for a week that did not meet my expectations at all. A very disappointed customer.

We we're very surprised at how high a spec it was. The owners have thought of just about everything that is required for your stay, the house is a real gem, I would highly recommend this house Alnmouth its self is a lovely seaside village,on a beautiful coast