Castle Leslie Estate

I visited with my mum for festive afternoon tea and we had a great experience- the Christmas decorations were beautiful, food was delicious and staff were extremely attentive and friendly. We were served by Ieva and Valeria and they were amazing. Will definitely return and would recommend to anyone!

Third time to stay at The Lodge. As usual, from check in to check out , we were treated like royalty. Our room was sumptuous. Breakfast was delicious, with buffet cereals etc, and hot breakfast of your choice brought to the table. Dinner in Conor's Bar was very nice and friendly but unobtrusive service. However, for that special occasion, Snafles Restaurant dinner service is sublime. But be warned, don't have a big lunch beforehand. Grounds are wonderful for a stroll. However, make the effort to do the Castle tour. Enda was our guide and history came to life in front of us, he's such an excellent story teller. Can't believe it's free.

Booked the Golden Years package in one of the Lodge rooms which included B&B and two dinners. We were at the hotel too early for check in (which is a bit late at 4pm) so we asked reception if we were ok to leave our car to go walking. Reception then rang me around 2.30pm to advise our room was ready. Which was great but as we were out we didn’t return anyway to nearly check in time. The grounds and village are lovely to walk around and we ended up covering about 5 miles. Check in was very efficient and we were shown to our room by one of the receptionists. Really loved the room and the complimentary mini muffins were delicious. Our only issue with the room was that the sink was very slow to drain and even with the heating as low as possible it could be incredibly hot despite opening the window. The room overlooked the stable yard and as a horsey girl I was pleased about that 😁. Had a two course dinner the first night in Connors bar which was delicious although I found the skin on the chicken dish very salty. All the staff were lovely apart from one lady who gave the impression she hated her job. Thankfully apart from her asking where we would like to sit, we didn’t see her again. Breakfast was excellent as expected, again the staff and service were great. Good selection of hot food options. Went to the castle bar (The Long Gallery) on the second afternoon for drinks and it was a lovely place to spend a couple of hours. Dinner on the second night in Snaffles which was five courses. This is where it became disappointing. The service and food were very good until I found a black hair in the blue cheese donut that came with the venison dish (the coating on the outside of the venison was also incredibly salty). When clearing the plates I pointed out the hair. At this point the waitress (Portuguese lady) told me it couldn’t possibly be one from the kitchen staff as they are all blonde…really? What a ridiculous thing to say (especially as I could see into the kitchen from where I was seated via a reflection in glass and they were most definitely not “all blonde”). I did not appreciate being told this as if I was some sort of idiot who would have believed this story. She then came back to the table with apologies from the chef who apparently said that the hair must have came from the deer…These silly excuses and lies annoyed us more than the hair because mistakes can happen and it didn’t put me off the rest of my dinner. I also pointed out how incredibly salty the version was to receive the reply “ there’s never enough salt on food for me I love it”. I wish now we had complained more and that I had sent the whole dish back. We still left a tip as the food and service on the whole was great. Shouldn’t have bothered really. We weren’t expecting anything to be taken off our bill as we were only paying for wine but it would have been nice perhaps to have been offered a complimentary drink. Check out the next morning was quick as we weren’t asked how our stay was. I wanted to advise reception of the slow draining sink in the room and of the silly excuses in the restaurant. It very much felt like “we have your money already, off you go”. Did the castle tour (which was really a walk into three or four rooms and more of a history tour). However it was very interesting and lasted well over an hour. Our guide Enda (?) was entertaining and engaging and we really enjoyed finding out about the history of the family, it’s characters and the house. Would the restaurant experience put us off staying again? No and I will be recommending it to others but in hindsight I wish I had been a little more forthright.

Stayed at the lodge for a cross country jumping clinic. Equestrian facility and trainers, specifically Orla, and Joe, were excellent… I couldn’t have been more pleased. Horses are in excellent condition. Safety for both horse and rider were priority. Spa was fabulous, Marcela gave me the best facial I’ve ever had! Rooms are nice, customer service is great, food was great. Pub outside of estate was fun to visit. There is a village with shopping - 10 minute drive.

Amazing experience at the Castle Leslie Equestrian Centre on Saturday. The staff are very professional and my daughter who was riding was in great hands. Need to mention my daughters horse, Betty who gave her a great adventure around the estate. If you are looking for a great Equestrian experience you need to check them out, she has not stopped talking about it. I enjoyed the Hotel lounge while I was waiting for her to finish, great service and very relaxing.