The Victoria Hotel

Ghillie’s restaurant. Absolutely excellent first class fresh tasty food. Lovely welcoming staff and very reasonable prices. Visited twice on our holiday. The vegetarian sweet potato and beetroot welllington was once of the nicest dishes I’ve had for a while. Can’t recommend highly enough

We stayed at the Victoria Hotel for 4 nights in March 2024, as we were on a working holiday the facilities were perfect, a lovely clean and cosy room with fantastic views overlooking the bay and beyond. Ian the Hotel manager was very welcoming and friendly as were the other members of staff who couldn't do enough for us. Breakfast was served by the lovely Angela with a great choice, breakfast room again with the views of the bay. We recommend this Hotel if visiting Rothesay for its service and location and above all such a warm welcome.

On the plus side, the Victoria is in the best position in Rothesay. The Victoria's rooms and corridors appear to have been recently decorated and carpeted and the cooked breakfasts were well prepared. The room was large and clean and well equipped. And, to repeat, you can't wish for a better location in Rothesay. It wouldn't take much to make it more welcoming, smart and attractive in the entrance and reception areas. And just get rid of the grimy old flagpoles! One completely spoiled the otherwise wonderful view from room 201! Externally, it looks down-at-heel, in need of a good paint (see my up to date photo rather than the main one here) and the service was not consistently customer focused. It's tricky to know where to park when you first arrive; there are no helpful signs and the road parking obscures the hotel entrance. The entrance itself has a closed bar as part of it. And an old rusty A board with one A4 paper on it telling you that the restaurant is closed. As other reviewers have mentioned, there are stairs! All the rooms are at least on the 2nd floor. The reception area on the first floor is unloved and uninviting; printed A4 notices on the desk and walls and with a cluttered feel, with Radio 2 blaring out all day. There doesn't appear to be an inviting residents' lounge, and no bar open, so nowhere other than the room to sit. At last, we did notice a lounge area on the way into the dining area, but it was partly closed off with more A4 printed notices, and not inviting. We didn't expect to have to settle the whole bill as soon as we checked in. We wouldn't have expected, either, to have to choose every single item of breakfast at check in. It's fair enough to have to book a time to have a cooked breakfast, when there are few staff around, but we had to ask for cereal as we hadn't specified any the day before. We were here for two nights and our room was not 'made up' during the middle day. This wasn't a problem for us, but smacks of lack of attention to detail. The restaurant was closed for dinner too, so we were directed to a sister hotel (The Esplanade). The food here was mediocre, although not expensive.