This is a nice hotel in the Lahemaa national park. The rooms are rather basic but they are perfectly adequate for 1-2 nights. The rooms themselves would be 3* but put together with the beautiful surroundings and the fact that it is spotlessly clean, friendly, and has a great restaurant, overall it deserved its 4*.
Perhaps, I was a bit naive and expected more as I thought it was a hotel, so I'll be thorough here. First, I'll write the negatives and then positives.
Negatives
- The sauna is expensive. 23e per person. We didnt bother with it. It would have been a good activity if it was 7e or so.
- Breakfast was limited. For 5.50e per person (included in your stay), I didnt expect much. Breakfast needs improving by giving us more choices. We should be able to order what we want to eat as some of us are intolerant to flour or sugar.
I ate lots of bacon, bread, had two helpings of sweet muesli with milk and a fruit plus one coffee and I was full up. Normally, I do not have flour or sugar but I had no choice as I was hungry and choices were limited. Its OK for one breakfast but not every day.
Positives
- Gorgeous surroundings
- Fantastic walks.
- Amazing photography opportunities! Especially black and white to develop in darkroom
- Good beds.
- Hot pressurised showers.
- Quiet and lots of fresh air.
- Good for a getaway.
- Fantastic taverna next door for fabulous dinners. I loved that place.
Recommend you get a car hire because we didn't get one. We depended on buses which come once a day in weekend and this limited our choices In what we can do this village.
Get a car hire, and drive around. You'll have a fantastic stay :)
We stayed for one night whilst visiting the national park, the hotel was clean and the bed was comfortable but there was no air-con (temperatures were in the 30s) so forced to open windows and then got badly bitten by mosquitoes. Staff appeared disinterested when we mentioned this, likewise not bothered by the cracked window or inadequate shower curtain which led to a flood in the bathroom. Breakfast was alright. Although just behind the manor house you have to pay to access the grounds from the hotel. There doesn't seem to be much choice of accommodation in the area, may be better to try staying somewhere on the coast or visit the park as a day trip from Tallinn if you have a car. We didn't find the national park terribly exciting!
I stayed in this hotel ( B&B inn?) as a member of staff in a group of basketball teams, over 40 persons. We were participating a tournament in Rakvere, the major town of this province.
The hotel is in the old distillery of the manor, the building is from the late 18th century.
This was very convenient place for us to stay.The rooms are clean; modest, but serve their purpose. The breakfast was as good as you expect in a B&B hotel, the only problem was that bacon and eggs were eaten up by this large group of young athletes so soon that not everybody got his share... But this is hardly a problem for the average tourist.
The old wooden floors are a bit squeaky and the walls are thin.
The manor itself is very nice, over 20 different buildings. the Manor House, a distillery, a brewery, a glasshouse, a cowhouse etc whatever belonged to a 18th-19th century manor.
The Manor is situated by a large natural park, Lahemaa national park, which is the first and largest (725 sq.km) national park in Estonia.
We stayed in Palmse Park Hotel during a pre-booked cycle tour of East and South Estonia. We enjoyed this place; it was probably the best accomodation we had during the trip. The hotel part of it is OK - the beds are clean, room is big enough and had a view over manor's park, breakfast was as expected for this price (juices, coffee, cheese, hams, bread, yougurt, cereals). Evening receptionist didn't speak Russian at all, for simple things her English was OK but we couldn't discuss anything beyond basic questions. In the morning receptionists spoke both languages perfectly; however they don't normally know much about what's going on in the manor museum (for example anything about a smithy next door). We didn't visit the hotel restaurant, instead opting to go to manor's tavern nearby (about 6 EUR for the main dish) and some wine in beautiful wine cellar underneath the manor (glass of manor-branded Riesling from Germany for 2.30 a glass). The best part of visit was having access to the manor and the park in the evening when there are no tourists at all; the grounds are there for the guests of the hotel (main building is closed of course). Quite an eerie feeling!
