Things were pretty quiet during my recent trip to the capital (for obvious reasons) but one place which was still lively was The Stafford hotel in central London.
Having stayed at a charming but extremely quiet hotel in Westminster the previous ni...
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UK (87 posts found)
Holiday destinations in the UK reviewed by luxury leisure reviews blogger ALadyofLeisure.com
You never forget your first Pig, as the old saying doesn't go, and with such fond memories of my stay at The Pig near Bath (check out my review 'A heavenly, foodie, country retreat') I was very excited to discover on a recent trip to Kent that I woul...
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Luxury hotel Christmas packages are getting booked early this year and with good reason. With the coronavirus pandemic far from over, it is uncertain what kind of restrictions there will be come Christmas Day but now more than ever, people want somet...
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After months of lockdown, exploring the Cotswolds near Stroud with a stay at the Bear of Rodborough hotel near Stroud, Gloucestershire was just the things to blow away the cobwebs. This 17th-century Cotswolds coaching inn, part of the excellent Fulle...
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I had been told that the Sunday roast at Feversham Arms hotel and spa in Yorkshire was not to be missed and my informant had been bang on the money. It was pronounced: 'A ten out of ten, the best I've ever eaten' by my dining companion, who isn't giv...
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When I first arrived at Gravetye Manor, the Michelin-starred country house hotel with award-winning gardens, I soon decided that this was one of the best hotels in West Sussex and when I was fortunate to revisit recently, there was nothing to make me...
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Now that hotels are able to open after lockdown, the Headland hotel in Cornwall might just be the place to blow away the hibernation cobwebs. Perched right at the end of the glorious Fistral Beach in Newquay and surrounded by, well, nothing but coast...
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Staying at a luxury country house hotel when the weather is terrible might seem like a bit of a waste – you can forget cocktails on the terrace, long country walks, or stunning photos to make your friends envious - so our trip to West Sussex spa hote...
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What is it like to stay at New Hall hotel and spa?
There are probably many historic hotels in Birmingham with a spa and swimming pool but I can't imagine that many of them come with a moat. In fact, I was trying to think of any hotels with a moat wh...
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While everyone's idea of a romantic getaway weekend is different, I think it's fair to assume there are some things which you have to expect: gorgeous bedrooms, a top restaurant serving great food, spectacular gardens for a romantic pre-dinner strol...
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Not having had the luxury of a clifftop spa hotel on the Lizard peninsula in Cornwall before, I didn't have much to compare Mullion Cove hotel with, but judging on my first visit I think it will be hard to beat.
The location of Mullion Cove ho...
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Reaching Thurlestone hotel in south Devon is like going down Alice in Wonderland's rabbit hole. You plunge off the main road along one of those high-hedged, single-track lanes which Devon specialises in and can do nothing but blindly follow its windi...
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My recent trip to Sherborne to review The Eastbury hotel was an unexpected delight. I had been looking forward to a stay at this luxury hotel as I'd heard great things about it but I knew almost nothing about Sherborne itself. I knew there was a cast...
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In terms of location, The Resident Covent Garden in London is hard to beat. A hotel right on The Strand and possibly the closest hotel to Covent Garden, you’ll find several hundred restaurants and bars less than two minutes walk away. It’s one of tho...
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Luxury country house hotels get booked up early for Christmas and with good reason: luxury hotels could be made for Christmas. Think of the best luxury country house hotels for Christmas and instantly you can picture the festive scene: comfy sofas, ...
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There are some hotels with spas and there are some hotels which ARE spas. Ragdale Hall health spa in Leicestershire most definitely falls into the latter camp, making a spa break at Ragdale Hall a must for any spa fans. The moment you arrive you are ...
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Fans of Germaine de Capuccini who are wondering where to get Germaine de Capuccini spa treatments in the UK, will be delighted to hear that award-winning hotel Park House hotel and spa in West Sussex is the latest hotel to offer the skin care special...
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Returning to The Swan hotel at Lavenham in Suffolk several years after my original stay, I was relieved to find that it was just as lovely as I remembered it. This time it also had the added attraction of its new (to me) Weavers' House Spa which had ...
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In just four hours I ate curry, fish and chips, stilton cheese, salt beef bagels, bread and butter pudding, salted caramel cheesecake and a bacon sandwich. With ketchup. Why? You might well ask. It was because I had decided to be a tourist in London ...
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If it's ghouls, ghosts and goblins you're after, then you have to spend Halloween in Derry Northern Ireland and experience its epic Halloween festival for yourself. Derry was voted 'Best Halloween destination in the world' by American newspaper USA T...
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The timing couldn’t have been better, at least not for the Hippodrome. The moment I walked past the gaming area in the central London casino, one of the slot machines paid out the entire jackpot, handing the person playing on the machine a cool £12,5...
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If you were to try and describe a classically British pub, then you’d probably come up with something like The Bull Inn, Sonning, in Berkshire. It’s got roaring fires and low beams, it is more than 600 years old, does great food and drink and is at t...
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'We just fell in love with the Isle of Wight,' said owner David Barrett as he showed me around Haven Hall, one of the newest B&Bs on the Isle of Wight. 'It's exactly like England was, 40 or 50 years ago.'
Now this could be a positive or a nega...
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It's the car marque of dreams (and Hollywood folklore): Aston Martin cars have been super-cool ever since James Bond fired up an Aston Martin DB5 in Goldfinger. While Britain's top spy has also driven an Aston Martin DBS, an Aston Martin V12 Vanquish...
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Halfway through our meal at The Vineyard hotel and spa, Newbury, I was beginning to wonder if I knew as much about wine as I thought I did. Not only could I not guess what grape variety I was drinking or what country it came from, I couldn't even wor...
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Lewtrenchard Manor is one of those classic country house hotels which actually feels like someone's home (a rather impressive stately home, that's true) rather than a hotel. Tucked away in the Dartmoor hills between Tavistock and Okehampton, Lewtrenc...
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While I've explored all over the New Forest for ALadyofLeisure.com, visiting hotels such as Chewton Glen, Lime Wood, Montagu Arms, Burley Manor and The Bell Inn, I had yet to make it all the way through the National Park to Lymington, right at the so...
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I'll be honest and confess I wasn't entirely sure about reviewing a B&B for ALadyofLeisure.com - not out of reasons of snobbery but because I usually write about hotels with massive restaurants, spa, acres of land and all the paraphernalia that c...
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The first time I visited Burley Manor Hotel in the New Forest I had absolutely no expectations - not because I thought it was going to be terrible, but because it had never even crossed my radar before. It turned out there was a reason for this: whil...
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If you're going to spend the night in a castle, then it's appropriate to look the part, which is why it felt very fitting arriving at the luxury hotel Bovey Castle in the heart of Dartmoor in a £150,000 Aston Martin DB11.
A trio of valets clad...
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I've been lucky to stay in some of the best hotel rooms in the country but for sheer romance it's hard to beat a Beach Suite at the delightful Cary Arms and Spa on Babbacombe Bay, Devon - in the heart of the 'English Riviera'. With a private terrace ...
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Arriving at The Pig near Bath
It is always nice to be greeted on arriving at a hotel by someone saying enthusiastically: 'You're just in time for lunch!' and even better when you are promptly whisked off to sit in the sun with a large G&T while ...
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The joy of reviewing hotels and restaurants is that with every new visit there is often something which will surprise, delight or even shock you. The Montcalm at the Brewery hotel in Chiswell Street in central London and its adjoining gastro-pub, the...
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It isn't often you plan on spending the night at a rather grand country house hotel and find yourself sleeping in a treehouse on stilts in the middle of a forest. But the treehouses at Chewton Glen, the five-star hotel and spa located deep in the hea...
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Just one night at the Spread Eagle Hotel Midhurst felt like a really long stay - but in a good way. I arrived there on Sunday afternoon, and by the time I left 24 hours later I'd had a 90 minute massage, swam, sauna'd, steamed and lounged in the spa,...
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Walking into a really gorgeous hotel room can be such a bittersweet moment. There is the initial reaction of 'Wow! This is really, really nice....!' and delight that this is actually all yours for the next 20 hours or so. Then there is the sudden rea...
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If the holiday season left you feeling in serious need of a relaxing break with country walks, a first-class spa and restaurant and cosy rooms to hide away in, then Bailiffscourt hotel and spa is the place for you.
Tucked away down a little countr...
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To arrive at Langshott Manor hotel is to jump back in time. One moment you are in urban Surrey, passing through towns like Redhill and Horley and driving though a modern housing estate, and then all of a sudden you arrive at a building unlike no othe...
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There's a warm glow which comes when reading a newspaper article called 'Cosiest pubs to stay in this winter' and realising you are heading off to stay in one of those featured that very day. This happened to me recently when about to head off to Th...
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With every cloud there comes a silver lining and the missing of our flight to Cape Verde meant an unexpected overnight stay in Bristol and my first experience of Hotel du Vin.
I'd long been aware of the hotel chain founded by Gerard Basset and...
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It's been receiving guests for more than 60 years but Park House hotel and spa is only now making the transition from well-kept local secret to firm fixture on the British country house hotel scene. With a new general manager - Mark Yates, formerly o...
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There is always a worry when it comes to revisiting a hotel which you totally adored on the first visit - what if it's not going to be as good as you remembered it? I know people who won't go to the same place twice for that very reason, and others w...
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If you like visiting beautiful English stately homes but hate the queues, the drive, the parking and the general hassle which usually goes with such visits, then Bowood hotel, spa and golf in Wiltshire has the perfect solution: its own fleet of golf ...
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I hadn't meant to embark on an impromptu Champagne cocktail-tasting session just after breakfast, but in keeping with the overall spirit of relaxation and pampering at The Greenway hotel and spa Cheltenham it seemed the right thing to do.
It was m...
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Exactly 600 years ago, the Bel and The Dragon coaching inn was built in the pretty Berkshire town of Cookham and six centuries later, I took a friend with me to stay at the pub and see what it was actually like. Well, you don't want to rush these thi...
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If your idea of a perfect summer's day is afternoon tea (or a gin and tonic) on a beautiful lawn in the sunshine, The Manor House luxury hotel in the pretty Cotswolds village of Castle Combe, Wiltshire, is the place to be.
There you can immers...
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If the England rugby team need somewhere to recharge their batteries after a tough game then they needn't travel very far: their training ground at Pennyhill Park luxury hotel in Surrey is just a drop kick away from one of the finest spas in the coun...
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Back in January 2015 I wrote a blog post in defence of little yellow photobombing cars, as the car owned by Peter Maddox, 82-year old resident of Bibury village in the Cotswolds, had attracted the ire of tourists come to photograph Arlington Row, sup...
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There is something rather special about a rooftop bar in London. The views might not be spectacular - we're not taking Rio or Hong Kong harbour here - but to rise above the traffic and gaze down at the crowds from on high feels incredibly luxurious. ...
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It's been quite a year! It started with an amazing culinary tour of Japan - a week full of sushi, puffer fish and bullet trains - and ended with a trip to Antarctica (which felt at times like a trip to another planet). During the rest of the year I ...
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A trip to the Cotswolds is always a treat and if you're in need of some bracing countryside walks, a hearty pub meal and then a nightcap in front of a roaring fire, then The Old Swan and Minster Mill in the pretty Cotswolds village of Minster Lovell ...
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I was feeling rather Christmassy anyway after ambling through Covent Garden with a glass of mulled wine and admiring the Christmas lights, but even the most Bah Humbug of Scrooges would have felt full of festive cheer arriving at the five-star The Ro...
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Being named The Sunday Times' Hotel of the Year, which The Painswick was a few years ago, can be a double-edged sword. On the upside, the phone didn't stop ringing once the news came out, bookings went through the roof and for a newly-opened hotel, i...
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You have to be deeply relaxed to nod off during a massage, so falling completely asleep, not once, but twice, during my treatment at the Lime Wood hotel spa shows what an incredibly relaxing spa treatment it was.
This was quite an achievement con...
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A definite perk of reviewing luxury hotels is that 'wow!' feeling when you walk into a hotel bedroom for the first time and find something completely unexpected. Unlocking the door to my suite at The Marylebone in central London was one of those mome...
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When it's hot in the city, your first instinct might be to run for the hills (or the coast) but just steps from the sweltering heat of Tottenham Court Road tube station, The Bloomsbury hotel is a great spot in which to cool down.
Its hidden se...
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My bedroom at The Gore hotel in Kensington was definitely one with the 'wow' factor. There were oil-paintings and gilt-edged mirrors and the bed itself was so vast and so high it felt as if I needed a footstool to climb aboard.
The epic theme ...
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The man who described Bibury as 'the most beautiful village in England' surely never went to Lower Slaughter. I've often driven past the road signposted to The Slaughters on my way through the Cotswolds but had never taken the turning.
It was only...
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Searching for luxury hotels among the beautiful rolling hills of the Cotswolds may sound like an easy task - there seems to be one round every corner. However with so many to chose from, it's easy to be overwhelmed. With most insisting on a two-night...
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It is hard not to start off a review of Noble Rot restaurant - as practically every other reviewer has done - with a nostalgic look back at days gone by, spent in the various pubs and wine bars of Lamb's Conduit Street.
It seems that every journal...
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A night in Kensington luxury hotel in South Kensington
I'd earlier I'd been at the Kensington luxury hotel in central London to drink cocktails at the launch of its bar, the K Bar. Now I was back at the luxury hotel close to many of London's museums...
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The view from the top of the five star luxury hotel ME London is a tourist's delight, taking in the essential sights of London, from the London Eye to Big Ben, St Paul's, Tower Bridge, The Shard and everything in between. Having evening cocktails on ...
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Turning up to lunch at Dinner restaurant in Knightsbridge - the restaurant from top chef Heston Blumenthal - with a copy of the menu from The Fat Duck at Bray (also by Heston Blumenthal, where my dining companion Simon had eaten just the week before)...
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It is just seconds from the shopping and traffic maelstrom which is Knightsbridge, but The Capital Townhouse hotel Knightsbridge boutique hotel in central London is the very essence of calm and tranquility. If you are looking for a place where the pa...
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For those who love the idea of staying in a luxury spa hotel in the Cotswolds (and who doesn't?) and are travelling with children in tow, Calcot Manor luxury hotel, just the other side of Circencester, is a great choice - a Cotwolds hotel and spa f...
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Within two minutes of arriving at Barnsley House hotel and spa in the Cotswolds I had completely fallen in love with it - and that's before I'd even tried out the private cinema, outdoor hot tub or delicious food. All these things were yet to come, b...
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Sexy Fish, the newly-opened £15 million restaurant from Richard Caring (The Ivy, Le Caprice, J Sheekey) doesn't actually look very sexy from the outside. It's rather plain and square and dull and looks not dissimilar from the NatWest bank it used to...
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The Arch hotel is not a flashy hotel. For a luxury hotel near to Oxford Street and just across the road from Madonna's London home, the Arch is neat, calm, and quiet.
It doesn't have the grand entrance or huge lobby of its immediate neighbours, th...
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Its claim to fame is that it is the closest hotel to Harrods, and it's true that less than 30 seconds walk will take you right into the iconic department store. But thankfully The Capital hotel, just next to Harrods on a quiet Knightsbridge street, i...
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There are some places that are so lovely you can't stop thinking about them after you leave, and Gravetye Manor in West Sussex is most definitely one of those.
[Note: this review of Gravetye Manor in West Sussex was first published in 2015 and som...
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St James's Hotel in London might be five-star luxury but thankfully it has none of the formal starchiness you might expect from a super-posh hotel. The staff are so cheerful and relaxed that I found myself having all sorts of random conversations wit...
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'Don't worry, you won't get a hangover,' insisted Pleurat Shabani, the maker of Konik's Tail vodka and the host of our martini marathon. 'I've never had a hangover drinking martinis.'
[Note: this review of drinking martinis at the best hotel bars ...
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It might not be located in the most beautiful part of London, but Qbic Hotel London City in Aldgate, East London, scores highly on all the essentials for a budget hotel in London: price, location and cleanliness, not to mention a friendly and relaxed...
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As beautiful settings go, Ashdown Park hotel East Sussex certainly has the 'wow' factor. It's easily one of the best hotels in East Sussex and a hotel with stunning views: walking through a stone arch to the garden terrace, the view suddenly opens ou...
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You would have to start pretty early and finish late to be able to squeeze in the maximum amount of relaxation possible at my Nirvana Spa day near Reading, the award-winning spa near London and one of the top day spas in the country.
I spent the w...
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One of the closest hotels to Charing Cross station in London, the Amba Hotel Charing Cross is surprisingly quiet, particularly for a luxury hotel in central London. In fact it turned out to be generally much nicer than I'd expected when I turned up a...
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Olivo, the Italian restaurant in Victoria London, used to be a lunchtime favourite of mine but for some reason I haven't been back there for about ten years. However when I finally returned I was delighted to find it hadn't changed a bit, which isn'...
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Tucked away behind the grey anonymity of Park Lane's high-rise hotel district which includes the Dorchester, the Intercontinental and the Athenaeum, El Pirata's tapas bar is a welcome sight.
You might not think of tapas in Mayfair but in spite of ...
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For frequent travellers to the capital who find hotels increasingly soulless - or just miss being able to cook dinner - there is another option: staying in a serviced apartment in London.
Rather than having to inhabit just one room and go out for ...
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The Compleat Angler, Marlow, is proof that some hotels don't need to have swimming pools, hot tubs and the very latest in beauty treatments - they just need to be in a great spot. Hotels in Marlow are blessed with a great location anyway as Marlow is...
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Staying at Huntsham Court, an exclusive use manor house in Devon, provokes a mixture of emotions.
Luxury wedding venue in Devon
Two recurring regrets of mine are a) that my family is neither posh nor wealthy enough to have a massive ancestral home ...
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All hotel visits linger in the memory afterwards but some leave a physical presence too - and in the case of the Athenaeum Hotel, a boutique hotel in Piccadilly London, it was Arthur. The teddy bear guarding my room was so sweet he just had to be lib...
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As befits the London hotel nearest the Lyceum Theatre, there was a lion right outside my hotel room at One Aldywch hotel. Well, to be more accurate, a Lion King.
The Lyceum theatre in Covent Garden, which has been home to the hugely successful Lio...
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It was when I was hiking along the North Devon coast in the rain that I started to question whether my plan to go on a boot camp to lose weight was worth its hefty price tag. Would I actually lose weight on a boot camp? I was halfway through a week a...
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It isn't every day I stay in a 17th century Palladian mansion but after just a few hours at Luckham Park luxury hotel near Bath I was walking around as if I had lived there for years.
Staying at Lucknam Park
I would grandly descend the staircase fr...
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Center Parcs is practically immune from criticism. With occupancy running at a staggering 97.2 per cent all year round, the private-equity owned leisure company is the envy of its peers.
In spite of the complaints about high prices during school h...
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There is something rather delightful about packing to spend the weekend in a hotel just four miles from your home. It yields all the excitement and anticipation of a trip away without any of the angst and despair caused by realising you have to d...
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