From spa hotels to seaside retreats
With foreign travel still looking uncertain, it’s going to be another big year for staycations – with Devon set to be a popular spot thanks to its sandy beaches and charming seaside towns. Wondering where to stay? Here are the best hotels in Devon.
Best Hotels in Devon
Reviews are taken from this year’s Great British & Irish Hotels Guide, you can read the full reviews online or purchase your print Hotels Guide here.
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![Lympstone Manor]()
Lympstone Manor
This handsome country house hotel is the culmination of experience gleaned by chef patron Michael Caines over an exceptional career as a Michelin-starred celebrity chef. Once the playground of the Baring banking family, it now has 21 glamorous guest rooms that take their names from birds of the Exe Estuary below them, as well as five new shepherd’s huts arranged around a pond in the grounds.
BOOK
+44 (0)1395 202040 / lympstonemanor.co.uk
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![The Pig at Combe – Gittisham, Devon courtyard]()
The Pig at Combe
As you approach this grade I-listed Elizabethan manor down the mile-long drive, surrounded by meadows, it slips tantalisingly in and out of sight, building a sense of romance that’s utterly fulfilled on arrival. Always a special place, it’s now brimful of life, bonhomie and stylish informality. With the main bar installed in the historic Grand Hall, the fun starts the moment you walk in. There’s a wonderful, double-aspect conservatory restaurant with bare wood floors, restored shutters and incredible views; cosy snugs with roaring fires; a bar with wood-fired oven in the ‘derelict chic’ Folly; huge raftered bedrooms in the attic; an atmospheric private dining room in the original Georgian kitchen and so much more.
BOOK
+44 (0)1404 540400 / thepighotel.com
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![Cary Arms & Spa]()
Cary Arms and Spa
Approached to by a narrow lane that descends the cliff, its location is nothing short of spectacular. Once ensconced in the Cary Arms & Spa – owned by Peter and Lana de Savary – you feel as though you’re in a Mills & Boon romance and Famous Five adventure rolled into one. Its delightful bedrooms, with echoes of New England-style, are each supplied with a stick of rock on the snow-white pillows. Eat Devon beef and Lyme Bay lobster in the stone-walled, slate-floored bar, or on pretty terraces that hang over the bay.
BOOK
+44 (0)1803 327110 / caryarms.co.uk
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![Hotel Endsleigh]()
Hotel Endsleigh
This delightful Regency cottage orné is set down a mile-long drive in its own secret valley. Built for the Duke and Duchess of Bedford, its 100-acre gardens were laid out by Humphry Repton, whose plans included placing hidden chimneys in the woods so they could see smoke curling prettily above the trees. Today, over a delicious meal, you can gaze on the same view from lovely terraces. Repton’s raised herbaceous border, the River Tamar and the tumbling woods beyond are a mesmerising sight. With its wooden floors and doors, Endsleigh brings to mind an endearingly old-fashioned Scottish shooting lodge, but one artfully blended with contemporary luxury and owner Olga Polizzi’s stunning eye for design.
BOOK
+44 (0)1822 870000 / thepolizzicollection.com
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![Horn of Plenty]()
The Horn of Plenty
The majority of Devon and Cornwall is within an hour’s drive of this elegant 19th-century country house hotel, a stone’s throw from the Tamar Valley. For starters, the views of patchwork fields and dense forest are sensational. The other big draw is the two AA Rosette fine dining restaurant that has just been completely re-built so that now the doors open onto a huge new, valley-facing, two-level terrace (the best spot for afternoon tea). The food is modern British, made from locally sourced produce and exquisitely presented. The 16 stylish rooms are split between the main house (built in 1866 with high ceilings, huge windows and exposed fireplaces), the original coach house and a sleek new wing – the best come with a private balcony overlooking the pretty walled garden.
BOOK
+44 (0)1822 832528 / thehornofplenty.co.uk
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