This is a consideration in a city whose centre is largely closed to motor vehicles and, where it is not, is a maze of small one-way streets. To find the Chaucer, you just drive round the Ring Road until you see the Bus Station on Upper Bridge Street and at the next roundabout the Chaucer Hotel is on your right, on St George's Place. The Hotel was originally a fine Georgian Town House, built on the site of a bell foundry where the original Canterbury bells may have been cast. There are now 42 bedrooms, all with private bathroom and the usual tea and coffe-making facilities, colour TV, radio, direct dial telephone, trouser press and hair dryer that one can expect from a Forte Heritage Hotel, which is what it is. Mary Tourtel, creator of Rupert the Bear, was a long-term resident at the hotel in later life.
Breakfast is taken buffet-style, in a now well established and convenient format.
The atmosphere is informal, which perhaps is welcomed by tourists. I was the only suit in a sea of sweaters. The impression as you go into the hotel is of a comfortable, cosy foyer with plenty of space but well divided into sitting areas, like a series of smaller rooms, with log fires, and attractively decorated with some interesting pictures, many of local scenes or events. There is a pleasant, longish room adjoining, with the bar at one end and plenty of comfortable chairs and sofas, with low tables, at which one can sit and have light meals, if that is what you want, Incidentally, the light lunches are a good feature and very reasonably priced. The dining-room is also attractive and pleasantly furnished.