Murray Arms Hotel and Seafood Restaurant, Orkney

Me and the missus (FAW) visited twice in 3 days whilst biking round South Ronaldsay in Orkneys . Fabulous island with such friendly folk. The owner is a Geordie lass from Wallsend and she knaas hor fish. Seafood platter one night and scallops/langustines next. Missus had scallops and yummy tuna. Place seems full up thanks to reputation for local catch. My only disappointment was the mussels (part of the platter). Really loved this restaurant set in a beautiful port.

Review is just for food. They charge 5p short of £18 for "Orkney Beer Battered Haddock". Their Orkney Beer, unlike an encouraging number of other Orkney pubs, is restricted to fizzy pasteurised keg, or bottled, not cask-conditioned ale. The fish was fresh, but the batter was thin and somewhat soggy, while the chips were dark brown, bordering on burned. The service was quick, and OK. All in all, not great value, not inedible, but not good enough to make me want to go back, ever.

We visited the Murray Arms last week for lunch and I would definitely recommend it. I had the locally caught Haddock which was lovely and fresh and my wife had the Pan Fried Scallops which was a huge portion and was absolutely superb. Despite the restaurant being very busy (both inside tabkes and the outside tables) the service was excellent. We will definitely be back again.

Our last day on Orkney decided to stop for lunch, an experience we will never forget. Sun was shining, warm, friendly, welcome, and decided to sit outside. Ordered a bottle of white wine (nicely chilled), and both decided on the local hand dived scallops and chips. We have travelled a lot and can say we never had such big juicy scallops. We thoroughly enjoyed our lunch and will never forget. We are already discussing the trip up here next year. Thanks so much for a dining experience.

Had lunch here and were not disappointed. On face of it looked higher end price wise but certainly got large portions. 7 hand dived large scallops for £25. Food brilliant. Courtyard in sun warmed our bones. Staff friendly. Wish we’d gone for seafood platter.

Beautifully decorated hotel serving very good food but disappointed by the way complaints were handled. We had some issues during our stay with our room not being cleaned despite being out of our room from 10.30am until 8pm. When we returned the following day at 3pm, to a still uncleaned room, the hotel manager informed us that staff had until 4pm to do housecleaning. No explanation or apology was offered although the manager was aware the room had been missed the previous day. Also had some issues dining in the hotel. While we enjoyed excellent service on one evening, on a second evening we had a wait of 90 minutes for food to be served and then had to send one meal back as cold. The dining room was cold and we overheard other diners complaining to staff about the temperature. The meal was then not invoiced correctly and we waited around while the hotel manager asked us to list what we had eaten and drank. There was no apology or recompense for the poor dining experience. Another issue was the light sensor in the bathroom. The windows in the bedroom didnt open so we had to keep the bathroom window and door open to cool the bedroom. The light kept coming on during the night interrupting sleep. Unfortunately, the light issue and poor customer service from the hotel manager mean we wouldn't choose to stay here again.