AN INSPECTOR CALLS

WHY do people tend to stay here? I ask a French intern working at The Bell near Epping in the hope of improving her English.

‘We get a lot of walkers,’ she says. I assume this is because of the proximity to Epping Forest, but it does not quite explain why most of the 79 rooms are taken on a Tuesday evening.

And it doesn’t look like a walker’s kind of place. This motel-style establishment on the busy B1393 serves Indian food in its Nirvana restaurant. Various TVs are attached to walls in the brightly lit bar; the decor is drab and my fellow guests don’t look like hikers.

‘No, no,’ says my wife. ‘She means workers, not walkers.’

Of course! This explains the notice: ‘Dirty work boots are not allowed in the restaurant.’

And the stale air. It also explains why Best Western gave up on The Bell a couple of years ago. It is now owned by an Indian, who may or may not be related to a charming waiter called Benny, who serves us our curries. We are the only ones eating.

Our room is reached via the bowels of the building and then up some stairs and along some corridors.

There are spores on the bathroom wall and the net curtains are filthy. The pillows are lifeless and we fail to see how a room such as this can be sold for £100. Even so, we sleep soundly because we’re at the back of one of the extension buildings.

Benny is there in the morning and takes pity on me when I spot two big help yourself canisters — one for undrinkable coffee, the other for undrinkable tea. ‘I’ll make you a fresh cafetiere,’ he says. There is nothing at the buffet we want to eat — but Benny’s coffee hits the spot. The French intern will have some stories to tell when she gets home.