The Croke Park Hotel, Dublin

We stayed here from 21-23 September, about two weeks after it opened. First things first, this hotel is NOT a ten minute walk from town, as it is advertised. It is in the middle of a pretty rough area of Dublin, and it's a ten minute walk to the nearest bus stop or at least a twenty minute walk to the top of O Connell Street, and you wouldn't want to walk it alone or at night! Our problems with this hotel started before we even arrived! We went to Dublin for my birthday, and my partner thought it would be a nice surprise to organise flowers and champagne in the room for when we arrived. He phoned the hotel and they said it wasn't the sort of thing they could do. Yet, when we arrived at the hotel there is a brochure in the room saying you just have to ask the porters if you want flowers delivered. I emailed Jurys to ask about something else, and didn't even get a response. We were suitably impressed when we arrived - once you get inside you can forget the area the hotel is in as the entrance is very imposing. We had booked a double room so were somewhat surprised to find a single bed in the room in addition to a pretty small double, but the bathroom was good, with a bath and walk in shower. The rooms were ok, but not as good as you would expect for a 4* hotel. The website and the brochure in the room talk about every room having a stereo but we were informed by reception, when we queried where ours was, that they hadn't actually arrived yet. Not being quite finished seemed to be a theme with this hotel. There seemed to be lots of random banging and work still going on, which only stopped in early evening after we complained for the third time. There was a spectacular view of a building site from our window, and be warned, if you are in a room at the back you will be woken up by the laundry truck at 5am. On our first night we were shattered from travelling so decided to have something light to eat in the bar (the hotel has two places to eat - this and the restaurant/bistro). The food here was good, once you managed to get served, which was verging on impossible! On our last night it wasn't such a sucess story! We decided to eat in the restaurant and went down there at about 8pm, only to be told that as we hadn't made a dinner reservation IN OUR OWN HOTEL, we couldn't eat. We complained to reception and the sales manager managed to sort out that we could have a meal from the restaurant but we were seated in a deserted side room. We noticed that the menu we were handed looked the same as the bar menu we had selected from on our first night and when we queried it we were told that there was a function in the restaurant that night and that everyone who wasn't part of it was being served from the bar menu. So why not tell us this in the first place?! To be fair to the hotel they wiped £30 off our bill and recommended a restaurant in town which was excellent, but it was a lot of hassle we didn't need and, with everything else included, it didn't make for a very relaxing break! We booked on Lastminute.com so we got a pretty good deal, but not a lot less than what everyone else pays. I don't really feel like we got what we paid for, and I hope all Jurys Hotels aren't like that!