Helen Browning's Royal Oak

We stayed here for 2 nights. The place is busy, the food is out of this world. There are young staff members who very happily look after you and make it their mission to make your stay memorable and welcoming. We were staying for a nearby wedding. The pub and hotel are about 20mins out of Swindon. No problem, its under £20 in a taxi. But when you are there. Tim, looks after you. He drove us to the wedding, arranged someone to pick us up at 11pm to take us back to the hotel and drove us to the train station when we left. I think this is what the world used to be like, when people really cared about the experience of others and looked after customers. It was such a welcoming happy environment we are looking for reasons to go back.. The rooms are comfortable and our room was large and v comfortable by any hotel standards. Ask for anything and they will try and make it happen. Dinner was a set in a welcoming, rustic restaurant/ pub with more than enough staff to assist. Young bright polite people looked after us . THE best ribs ever - organic, from the farm and a gorgeous large mackeral. If you’re staying in the hotel, there’s an honesty bar and a lounge with fridge , milk , drinks etc andrea and coffee making facilities in rooms. Dyson hairdryers, room fans. It’s honestly difficult to know where to stop this positive review. The owners are passionate believers in the customer experience, organic food, and a wholesome friendly atmosphere. It’s really difficult to see how anyone could give this place a negative review. We loved it. PS the farm shop on site is superb. Thank you Tim and staff for giving us a bubble of wonderful memories for 48hrs. The world needs more of this

Simply sublime stay at this perfectly placed gem of a small hotel. Booked literally last minute when our flight was delayed and it was too tiring to complete our onward journey home. Our room upstairs had a huge bed and two super comfy easy chairs. Spacious shower room. Everything here is designed for your comfort and relaxation, great mugs for your morning coffee with fresh milk! Fluffy towels, plush pillows. Great attention has been taken when it comes to detail within these individually designed rooms. We wiled away a pleasant hour in the comfy wallow. Fresh breakfast, great produce. Super friendly folk! Love this place.

You cannot fault the endeavour here which offers accommodation, entertainment/events, farm shop, cafe, organic produce and excellent heritage in a great location.The service and welcome was brilliant as well. Excellent drinks range and cask beer. My slightly lower rating is down to some of the lunch menu offerings and variety. Seasonal asparagus sings for itself but on toast? with dry cabbage? - didn’t really wow. You’d expect oustanding meat here but the gammon was underwhelming, some said ‘chewy’. Ok they do offer pulled pork and grilled mackerel (and of course pizzas and burgers), and they could be fantastic. I know I seem nit-picky, but the bill was above average for a wine-free offering and I hoped for a little more zing. Won’t stop a return visit though or a recommendation.

Sunday lunch should have been busy and wasn’t. I had beef roast. Some elements of the food were great, others a little odd (small squishy tough roast potatoes, horseradish sauce). Vegetarian tart excellent. Ambience out of character with an old pub. Young service staff worked hard. Many better value choices around. Too much price difference for me.

Delicious Sunday roast. I had the mixed roast, loin of pork and beef. Totally delicious. Very good Yorkshire pudding, rare beef and tender pork, crispy melt in your mouth roast potatoes, mixture of vegetables, broccoli,parsnips, leeks, carrots and great gravy. Very good service for a large family party. Lovely affogato for pudding

Overall initial impression was comfortable and smart, but once inside, the flaws are apparent. The main issue is that the rooms are simply too small - most importantly, definitely too small for the price - resulting in just a double bed, which is too small and uncomfortable for two people. When I am staying in a place like this with a more expensive price tag, I certainly do not expect to have to sleep in just a double bed. Even with this small bed, there is not a lot of space left in the room, and it feels squashed when moving around. I am a size 8, and I found the shower too small (e.g. when washing hair, there is no room to move out of the stream of the shower when needed), and the shower head is too high (it appears not to be adjustable). Breakfast - I ordered the Eggs Royale. It was, in the event, inedible - the hollandaise tasted of nothing but vinegar. When the waitress came to collect our plates, I told her, and she did not really react, and there was no offer of a replacement or apology, no-one returned to me. Clearly, the chef does not know how to make hollandaise, and is not tasting his food when he should. In hindsight, I should have refused to have paid for breakfast. Other than that, the food at dinner was pretty bland. I had haddock (not in batter) and no effort had been made to cook it nicely or prepare a sauce for it. My meal was rather dry and tasteless. The STP for dessert had barely any sauce, and was really just dry sponge with ice cream. All rather disappointing. The outside areas looked really messy and scruffy. In terms of the staff we encountered, they were all nice, but the whole experience all felt rather 'bitty', it did not feel seamless. So, the decisive factors for us were the food along with the size of the room and the bed for the price. Overall, most definitely not worth the price tag, and we spent well over £200 for one night + food. We do not go away often at all, so we were looking forward to this, but it was all just such a disappointment.