The Fairfax Arms

The accommodation impresses with its cleanliness, comfortable rooms, and attentive staff. Guests appreciate the convenient location near Helmsley and the variety and quality of the breakfast served in the conservatory.

We booked here for our Anniversary back in November for 2 of us, I then called & asked if we could book another 2 people a few weeks ago I was told yes that’s fine but when we arrived we were given a small table in the bar which tbh wasn’t big enough, we were disappointed that we were given this table in the bar & not the restaurant area having booked a while back. 2 of us ordered starters & all ordered mains which took about 40 mins to arrive after the starters, it was busy but if you can’t provide the service don’t take the bookings for me that’s down to greed. The sunday lunch was nice but the cauliflower cheese & roast potatoes weren’t the best, we then asked for more gravy as we were given 2 tiny gravy pots between 4 only to be prompted with “more gravy” by the waitress! I also asked to see the dessert menu before our food arrived but when we had finished our mains none of the waitresses came back to take our dessert order so we paid & left but we all had drinks and the bill came to nearly £200. We eat out a lot & have had Sunday lunches in lots of different restaurants so when you’re paying premium you expect premium food & service.

Shame about the heating. This was a second visit to this hotel for us. As we were meeting friends to celebrate early Christmas at Castle Howard. The hotel is well located, with an excellent chef and food menu. The staff are all helpful and friendly. The rooms are a reasonable size, with good ensuite facilities, and comfortable bed. However both our rooms suffered with heating problems, one with a cold radiator and the other with a leaky and cold radiator and we were advised to use the plug in radiators provided but not till after we had queried the situation. Our friends had to ask to move rooms due to the leak. This was all done easily but it was a disappointment to us that it appeared to be a known problem and we'd still been given these rooms. Such a shame when it is a lovely old inn in a beautiful village setting.