I stayed at the BW Gonville for 3 nights, and although the room was fine (spacious, clean, comfortable), the reception staff was not at all what I was expecting. With what little I asked of them, it was abundantly clear that they were not concerned with keeping guests happy with any attempt at courtesy! The room itself was fine - plenty of space, comfortable bed, adequate space for clothing/luggage - but the bathroom was a bit noisy (toilet/sink), although this did not detract from my stay. Because of the key-card entry, people tend to pull (YANK!) their doors shut, thus noise transfers easily from the corridors (but suppose this is standard for most hotels?). Free wireless was a bonus, and the breakfasts were nice. The bar service was OK (sometimes quick, sometimes a very long wait).

In fact this is not a 4 stars hotel. Everything is very "de mod?", the furniture and the deco is old fashion and decrepit. The room smelled to humidity, the window didn?t close well and I could hear all the traffic on the street; the mattress was terrible, so soft, that I wondered if I would end lying on the floor; the TV set is 30 cm above the floor, etc. And the fare is not really cheap: 139 GBP

This stay has been one of the most dissapointing stays I have ever experienced! We arrived at 13:45 and were told to wait the extra 15 minutes until the official check-in time. While I understand that hotels have an official check in time, most hotels would have let us check in 15 minutes early. At 14:00, we tried to check in. Even though we booked our room through Best western's own web site, there was no booking for us at the hotel. We were asked to log in to our e-mail account, retrieve the confirmation number which still didn't help as even the confirmation number we had on e-mail didn't exist in their system! After all of that, we asked for a room at the same rate. Luckily the hotel was only 20% full. We finished the check in process at 14:20 and arrived at the room only to discover that our room hasn't even been made! The bed and bathroom were still messy from previous visitors! And I thought that the whole point of checkin time is to allow the hotel staff enough time to clean the rooms. We left the luggage in the room, went to complain at the reception which promised to clean the room by the time we came back. We left the hotel for a few hours. Came back at 18:00. The room had been made up, but empty drink cans remained by the bed side cabinet from the previous visitors. We then discovered that the TV didn't work! At this stage, we decided that enough is enough! We asked to change a room and were able to move to a better, slightly larger room which was OK. All of that for a price of ?129! Which I didn't think is that cheap. I have had much better treatment in hotels costing half of this.

My stay at the Gonville was booked through my employer on a dinner, bed and breakfast basis (?90) from Saturday to Sunday. The car park was crowded on my arrival at 1700hrs; this may heve been due to the wedding reception that was taking place, but I occupied the last parking space. Reception and check in was swift and efficient, and my spacious second floor single room had a superb view over Parkers Piece and central Cambridge. The room was very comfortable, with a small but well- equipped bathroom with a bath and shower. The television had Freeview channels, but was very complicated to work properly. Dinner in the main restaurant was excellent, served promptly and with tasty food. I was able to use a free Internet computer terminal in the hotel lobby for an hour after dinner; regrettably it did not permit the use of a CITRIX device for remote access. Breakfast on Sunday morning was also very tasty; an unusual part self service and part waiter service operation for the hot food. Check out was trouble free. All the staff I encountered were pleasant and polite, and spoke good English, although for none of them was it their mother tongue. The Gonville is certainly worth investigating for a business or leisure visit to this famous city.

We stayed here for one night, mainly due to a good price with Nectar points. The location in Cambridge is very good and the room was fairly big, clean and comfortable. However, it lacked style and the furniture seemed a little cheap and nasty. The bathroom was functional, but the shower pressure was a joke - little more than a trickle of water! Service was OK, but when we went to reception to ask for some still water ( tap water would have been fine), it seemed to totally confuse the person behind the desk, who was gone for about 10 minutes looking for some. He eventually turned up with sparkling water and told us that we should be grateful because usually they charge for it! Breakfast was ok, but nothing special. Visitors should not expect luxury from this hotel, even though the high prices may suggest so.