Chateau le Prieuré Saumur - la Maison Younan

The hotel property is impressive and we wanted to love it, so I will start with the positives first. It’s a beautiful old building with extra rooms in an annex. Be prepared for a lot of Napoléonic/Baroque decor, gold, and blindingly bright colors. The decor is over the top and amusing. The view from the terrace is spectacular and potential guests should ask for a room off the back of the main building/chateau. The food at Le Priere is exceptional. We had a great dinner, delicious lunch, and plentiful breakfast. The morning staff were very friendly, but dinner servers not so much. However, they were very efficient and polished in their work. Our annex room was huge with plenty of storage, and the bedding and towels were nice. An upright fan and space heater are provided. The main negatives were as follows: Our room was moldy smelling and felt damp. When barefoot, the bright blue carpet seemed moist, so we kept our shoes on. The floor also had some mystery stains. The old wallpaper was peeling, and the room was very dusty and cobwebby in the corners. The small safe was not bolted to anything and therefore not practical to use. When we returned from an outing one afternoon, the slider was not locked. It’s extremely unlikely, but a determined criminal could have accessed our room. Thankfully, there were no problems with that. Weirdly enough, some guests actually wandered into our room (thankfully we were decent!) thinking it was the lobby. The signage to the reception isn’t obvious. Our large bathroom had several issues: The shower floor was moldy (pink and black slime) and hadn’t been cleaned as evidenced by hair left on the surfaces. The shampoo and soap were almost empty and we didn’t notice until the morning we checked out, so we had to improvise with what little was left. WiFi was practically nonexistent. It was a bit better in the main part of the hotel. Overall, Le Priere is an impressive hotel, and we had a decent stay. Housekeeping needs to do a better job with cleaning the showers and with dusting, and the annex room needs a good dehumidifier. The best part of our stay was the dining - bravo to the chef!

Great atmosphere, and all staff was very kind and helpful.