The Bottom Line
- Homey and comfortable
- Large rooms, oversize beds
- Amazing gardens with outdoor, heated swimming pool and year round hot tub
- Close to York Racecourse
- Generous breakfast
- Decor a bit dated
- institutional type toiletries
Description
- Address: The Mount, York, YO24 1GU, England, United Kingdom
- Tel: +44 (0)1904 628 856
- Visit their website
- Price Band: $$
- Popular with jockeys, trainers and owners during the racing season at York Racecourse
Guide Review - York Hotel Review - Mount Royale: Comfort and Warm Welcome Near York Racetrack
Don't.
The Mount Royale, run by owner Christine Oxtoby, is friendly, comfortable, unpretentious and relaxed. I stayed in one of the garden suites on a wing of newer rooms extending out into the hotel's rear gardens - of which more later. The corridor leading to the garden suites is actually a glass roofed, carpeted "greenhouse" lined with oranges, lemons, figs, bougainvillea and other semi tropical plants. My room, equipped with an American-proportioned King-sized bed, had a shady terrace, a spacious, well-equipped bathroom, a walk-in closet-cum-dressing room, a desk with internet access, a small raised area with television and several padded chairs. If you grew up in the 1970s, in an affluent American suburb, your parents probably had a room something like this - down to the thick, quilted, flower-printed bedspread and matching draperies. My only quibble - the unbranded soap was impossible to open - with teeth, a nail file or the small fruit knife I found.
In the early evening Wallace the Westie (the Mount Royale is dog-friendly) and I explored the garden off the terrace. We wandered from one garden "room" to another, through ivy covered arbors, into groves of flowering shrubs, past stands of evergreens and Roman fountains. Next day, I was astonished to discover that the complex layout is packed into only an acre - as cleverly as the contents of Dr. Who's Tardis!
Breakfast was tasty and generous - Wallace liked the sausage. All in all, highly recommended by us both.
