The gang of men stood around the entrance drinking Strongbow should have rung alarm bells, but it took until getting into my room at the Travelodge Chieveley until I realised this was the most ghetto Travelodge I've had the 'delight' to stay in.

Based next to a delightful lorry park, the place stunk of cigarettes (although apparently it's a no smoking hotel). Continuing the ghetto theme, my room key handily had my room number sellotaped to it. I'm guessing the last people who stated here left in a hurry and didn't leave the key.

Dicing with death, I managed to turn on the lights without electrocuting myself on the switch that was coming away from the wall. Unfortunately though, I couldn't see out of the window as the glass had misted on the inside. The final delight was trying to close the curtains - they were hanging off the rails, and were only being stopped from coming out of the end of the rails with a handily placed rubber band - the DIY guy must have been having a day/week/year off.

Given the chance again, I'd definitely stay somewhere else!

We booked into this travel lodge to break our journey from Ireland via Wales, to our Kent destination. We expected basic accommodation, but our room felt like it had seen better days. there was a distinct air of neglect and seediness about it. We lay on the bed to find out that it collapsed slightly at the end we lay our heads. The pillows were thin and we only got one each. the sheets were clean, the chair old and hard, and the pull-out bed for our daughter looked suspiciously manky. Otherwise the room was clean enough. Maybe we should have asked for more pillows, or complained straight away, but just felt that it was cheap, and only for one night. We did tell someone about the bed before leaving.

We stayed for 3 nights end of July 2011 as we were going to Hawk Conservancy and Highclere Castle.

We had a room "in the middle" (it didnt face to lorry park of the A road, but some other rooms in the parallel building)

Check in was quick and easy. Our room was a good size and was clean - yes the tiles could have done with regrouting a they had started to discolour, but this was age more than dirt. There was a dull him of traffic, but not so much it disturbed any sleep. The noisiest thing was inconsiderate guests slamming doors and talking outside our room!

There was plenty of hot water, tea and coffee in the room. The water did taste a bit chemically though, so we bought some "Basics" water from a supermarket in Newbury to make it with - much better!

The M&S food wasn't as expensive as i thought, and sold yoghurt/muffins/instant porridge you can add hot water too if you wanted breakfast, but we went into Newbury as you get 3 hours free parking at the Sainsburys so there is plenty choice of where to eat. We did that at night too.

I didnt hear the HGVs and even though we left about 9 each morning, there didnt seem loads in the car park, but with an open window i can see how it could be noisey. We drove past the Hilton literally backs on to the motorway, so think that would be worse!

We paid £26.50 a night for the room, and I do not feel hard done by for that,but f you want to spend long periods in the room, am not sure this is for you. (We were out from 9 to 7.30 ish each day so was fine for us)

The TV does not get Channel 4 - strangely but u have BBC1, 2, ITV 1, 2, E4, channel 5, C Beebies and BBC news. We took a DVD player but didnt end up using it!

Would consider staying again if I were doing things in the area

We stayed here to break our journey as we needed to be in the west country early in the day. This was the first time we'd stayed in a service station, and so we had gone with an open mind and expected some noise. However this place was really noisy, our room backed onto the lorry parking area and we had several hours of lorries making a lot of noise and so got hardly any sleep. We would have been better off taying at home and getting up early to drive. The bed was very soft, and uncomfortable.

To be fair to them, It might be better if you had a room on the other side of the building away from the lorries, but the night we stayed they were full so we couldn't move.