I have known the Pond for some years, and it's had many owners, some of them large groups. It's now independently owned, and marketed through Best Western.
I stayed there last night. Rooms look to have been recently modernised and are clean and orderly with flat screen TV's. Staff are efficient and helpful. I entertained two local friends for dinner, - they hadn't been in for a while and were really very pleasantly surprised by the quality of the dinner we had. In particular, the Rump of Lamb was well executed. A nice Australian Shiraz helped it down. A good nights sleep but it would probably be better to ask for a room on the opposite side to the main road.
Breakfast was a bit disappointing - as is usully the case with hot buffets, you get some items hot and some cold ! The scrambled egg was a gelatinous mass. If you wanted a fried one you had to wait. Coffee was also pretty lousy to my taste, and those pats of butter wrapped in a 'parcel', surely it wouldn't cost extra to have the 'pull off top' type .
I have given four stars, but probably 3 and a half is nearer the mark because of the poor breakfast. read more