The Punch Bowl Inn by Angela Moore

Ahh, the Punch Bowl. It’s set just outside the tiny village of Crosthwaite, in a mini-hamlet consisting of a stone church and the inn itself. Views from the windows are of hills of the rolling, green persuasion, scattered with handfuls of sheep and neatly divided up by flinty-grey stone walls. If you were ever to lie back and think of England, this is what you would picture.

Downstairs, there is good food in the restaurant and good beer in the cheery bar, complete with fireplaces. It’s not smart or formal or fussy or conceptual – just white linen tablecloths and silverware glittering in the firelight. There’s always a bit of a buzz on, partly because the inn is always, always full and partly because wellie-wearing locals pop in for quick halves of beer brewed at The Drunken Duck, the sister inn up the road. (The Duck is reviewed elsewhere; it’s also much-loved but we feel this is the better place to stay.) If you do need a few quiet moments to yourself, there is a tiny resident’s lounge with a fireplace where you can curl up with a book.

No hotel is perfect but if you’re looking for a relaxed weekend in a Cumbrian inn, the Punch Bowl – like Mary Poppins – is practically there.

The rooms
There are only nine rooms, named after former vicars from the church next door. While each is different, they all have an oak-beamed romance and simple, charming décor with a judicious use of chintz.

Throughout, bathrooms have both showers and freestanding Victorian rolltop baths. All rooms also have flatscreen tvs and Roberts Revival radios.

Pick of the lot is Noble, which runs the length of the top floor. It has an extremely sexy bathroom, huge, with a double shower and two roll-top baths standing side-by-side.

Peake, Cooper and Birkett are standard rooms; Cooper has a good valley view and a modern four-poster bed. Danson and Hebblewhite are the more romantically beamy of the superior rooms. Strickland is a standout because of its high ceiling and because, to make up for its lack of valley view, it has been papered in slightly startling, hand-blocked Farrow and Ball paper.