Spa Getaway at Foxhills Country Club (Surrey, UK) Review

We love getting away just for a night and treat ourselves to a nice dinner and a theatre piece in London and leave the children with the grandparents. Every now and then it’s soul-saving, we need this treat for ourselves and for our marriage as well. For 24 hours or so, no listening to the children’s demands, no tantrums and forget about our worries as parents (even though, of course we keep talking about them) – ultimately, it is about keeping the fire burning. So, after Bobcat’s 5th birthday, with my parents still visiting, we eloped to the beautiful Surrey Hills (they are on our doorstep, only about 30 minutes drive to South-West London) and booked a great last minute deal at the Foxhills Country Club Spa & Golf. The deal sounded fantastic: £123 for a standard room, including 9 holes golf, full English breakfast and £25 Cuisine Credit per person. It’s good to explore our local area too, we can’t always hop on a plane or do long drives.

We were lucky to be bumped up to an Executive Room (clever move from the room division and the revenue manager: rather bump up and sell out than not at all, it’s Sunday night after all).  Thanks guys! We loved the room, it was fantastically spacious and looking at the difference between the standard room and this one on the pictures, we were very pleased. Looks like the exec rooms were very recently refurbished. With a huge bathroom, overlooking the tennis courts, our room couldn’t be better. I was relived to see the minibar – as a former hotelier, I absolutely hate the new trend of having empty or no mini bars in hotels. If it’s got 4 stars – it’s GOT to have a minibar. The room was of course spotless, as you’d expect and I loved being able to make a decent cup of coffee with ground coffee – without the awful, environmental damaging capsules! I thought that was really cool.

On the left: the building with our room.

So before we checked in, we had a little walk around and a quick, sandwich lunch in the XIX restaurant near one of the golf courses, which was nice.

Then I had a lovely facial (with some vegan products) booked in the spa (£55), which was about 40 minutes long and then we both headed to the swimming pool and did quite few laps – it was very refreshing, the pool wasn’t cold enough for my husband, but I really enjoyed it. No photos from here as the spa has a strong no phone policy. It felt odd for the first 10 minutes not having my phone or camera with me, but it also helped me to relax, to be honest. 

Then, late afternoon, my husband decided to give me golf lessons as he didn’t want to play on his own. The evening sunset was so pretty around the manor!

After finishing golf, we literally just relaxed in the room, had an uninterrupted shower and watched some Sunday night television with a glass of prosecco – something extraordinary and ordinary at the same time, but it felt special. The dinner at the main restaurant was great, the restaurant wasn’t packed of course and the staff was very attentive and nice. Before dinner I was a bit worried about the lack of meat-free options on the menu but I shouldn’t have had. The menu is small – which is always a good sign and you can hope for fresh, local(ish) ingredients. No vegan options, but there were some vegetarians, so I picked wild mushrooms on ale bread toast, beetroot and goats curd tortellini (I love this flavour combination and I adore beetroot), also creamed potato with truffle (this was a stupid choice with the main but I had no idea how will be the main dish presented. It’s hard to tell these days in haute cuisine. Anyway, the main dish was outstanding and looked like this. Gorgeous, isn’t it?

Next morning, after a healthy lie in we had a lovely breakfast and long walk again. Breakfast was nice – we didn’t really liked the scrambled eggs and there were no other egg options either. I was fantasising about the a yummy and healthy hotel breakfast all morning and it didn’t disappoint me. (Husband was a little disappointed with the eggs. Or the lack of them really.) The other thing is I rally don’t get: why are people so obsessed with the little individual Kellogs cereal boxes? Such a waste. (And full of sugar. Just saynin’!) But look at my granola, fruit, raw nuts, Skyr yogurt, full of goodness breakfast. (Granola is a bit sugary too though!)

We also discovered how lovely everything looks in the morning sunshine – we were very lucky with  the weather indeed. Planning to visit with the children too when they are up for it, sometimes it’s just nice not to go on a long journey but find everything what we need within a short drive. So Foxhills also have a Youth Club (we didn’t not check this out) and various indoor and outdoor pools. The Spa is reserved for adults over 16 years of age, so that people who want some peace, can actually get it. Great idea. But we’ve met lots of families with young children on Sunday afternoon, around the Youth Club, in the kiddie pool (indoor) and playing golf or tennis. (They have a few courts with different surfaces. We didn’t play tennis in the end as hubby forgot the gear at home. Gah!) It seemed like Foxhills has everything for everyone, given that they have so much space both outdoor and indoor, that it’s possible. It’s definitely good to know!

And because I’m a former hotelier, I had to have a little tour of the main building, it’s beautiful! I still have this thing for great, grand hotels, apparently!