Driving through Western UP at night is not advisable. The best way is to leave Delhi at about three or four AM, pelt through Moradabad a couple of hours later without stopping, to avoid the daily morning ablutions happening on the other side of the road and pull over for a cup of tea only when you reach Kashipur or Ramnagar. You have never been stuck in traffic jams if you have not seen the ones in and around Hapur en route, which can be caused for any reason. It is a distance about 280 kilometres from New Delhi here. And Claridges is about another 30 kilometres upriver.
Roads are very good to OK all the way.
In season Corbett is best avoided because it is flooded, swamped, overrun, by government types who make a bad habit of driving inside the park in loud cars. Off season you will need to be cautious but if you really need to do the nature trail, nothing like it. There are also cheaper and in some cases better located government rest houses and bungalows along this route which need some amount of sarkari patta or government connections to get into. They are usually unoccupied but the guards will not let you near them unless you offer them a straight bribe.