AN INSPECTOR CALLS

His mission: To test hotel hospitality to the limit

FRIENDS of Prince Charles reportedly stay at the Ragged Cot (it’s close to Highgrove and a mile or so from Minchinhampton) and it’s even been suggested that Charles has given the place money. If so, it hasn’t been enough.

Our room on the ground floor is small, airless and in bad need of help. For £120 a night, you don’t want a big stain on the carpet, grubby tiles in the shower and a window that faces the back of another building. And what makes it especially disappointing is how it all looks so lovely on the website, with moody black-and-white pics and a lot of talk about its ‘wonderfully shabby chic style’ and how it’s the ‘ epitome of countryside cool’. It’s nothing of the kind.

Parts of the building go back 300 years, but the add- ons don’t work, especially an odd space called The Shed, where you eat breakfast.

We’re here on a baking Saturday night and the staff just aren’t up to speed. Getting a drink takes an age and we have to ask several times if it’s possible to open a window in the stuffy dining room. We’re gasping for fresh air amid thrilling Cotswold countryside.

The food, however, is fine, with the main dishes presented on huge decorative platters.

Then comes a mystery. I ask for some olive oil to drizzle over a side salad, but am told there isn’t any.

I assume that the waitress — who has little English — has misunderstood me and ask for the manager. He confirms that, indeed, there is no olive oil. ‘We cook with oil, but we do not have any refined olive oil to put on the tables.’ We are speechless. Breakfast in The Shed is cramped and you surely can’t be charged extra for an espresso or cappuccino. You are here.

Reception is still closed at 9.30am when we are ready to leave. You settle up with the woman cooking the eggs in The Shed.

We say goodbye, but her back is already turned. The Ragged Cot Inn

Cirencester Road Minchinhampton GL6 8PE

Tel: 01453 884643, theraggedcot.co.uk Doubles from £90 b&b