Hotels in the UK have the worst service in Europe !

As a rule I do just what you say -- avoid the big cities except for those attractions I feel important to see, and stay in smaller cities and towns.  It makes for a more relaxed vacation.

I have to say my experience with hotels in London has been the opposite -- that they are quite good, although expensive.

I'm curious also what would have happened with more hotel detail. We generally don't stay in the big hotels; we look for the local ones, especially ones that cater to lower-budget families traveling, sometimes in their own countries...and I can't say we've had any complaints to write home about in France, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Norway...nor England, where we had two pleasant experiences with a small and a tiny hotel.

In fact, our only service complaint was with an "airport" hotel (quotes because it was a 30-minute ride over the mountain into the next province) that had terrible food and nearly no staff.