Barrow Upon Trent

Barrow upon Trent has no hotels of its own, being a small residential village, so visitors looking for hotel-style accommodation will typically base themselves in nearby Derby or in the villages and small towns scattered across South Derbyshire, such as Melbourne. Derby offers the widest choice, from budget chain hotels near the station and ring road to a handful of boutique and coaching-inn style options in the city centre, all within a fifteen-minute drive of Barrow upon Trent. This makes it easy to combine city comforts, shops and restaurants with quiet days out along the Trent Valley.

For something with more character, the surrounding countryside has a number of traditional coaching inns and pubs with rooms, several dating back a few hundred years, offering a more local feel than a city-centre hotel. The Crewe & Harpur, a 17th-century former coach house between Swarkestone and Melbourne, is typical of the kind of historic pub accommodation found in this part of Derbyshire. Staying in one of these puts you within easy reach of Swarkestone Bridge, Elvaston Castle Country Park, Melbourne's Georgian streets and the Anchor Church caves near Ingleby, without needing to travel into Derby itself.

Whichever base you choose, the compact geography of this stretch of the Trent Valley means nowhere is very far from anywhere else. A hotel in Derby, Melbourne or one of the riverside villages all put you within a short drive of Barrow upon Trent and the quiet lanes, water meadows and historic churches that make up its immediate surroundings, as well as the northern fringe of the National Forest a little further south.

The surrounding stretch of the Trent Valley punches well above its weight for a small rural corner of Derbyshire, with a good spread of historic and natural sights within a short drive.

• St Wilfrid's Church, Barrow upon Trent — A medieval stone church with Anglo-Saxon elements in its nave, granted to the Knights Hospitallers of St John in 1165 and worth a look for its age alone.
• Swarkestone Bridge and Causeway — A few miles east, this 13th-century stone causeway across the Trent is the longest inland bridge in England and was where Bonnie Prince Charlie's army turned back for good in 1745.
• Anchor Church Caves — Hand-carved sandstone caves near Ingleby, about a mile and a quarter from the village, overlooking the river and reputedly once used as a hermitage.
• Elvaston Castle Country Park — One of Britain's earliest country parks, with 200 acres of parkland, ornamental gardens, a lake and Gothic Revival castle buildings, a short drive north.
• Melbourne — A handsome small town a few miles south with a wealth of Georgian buildings, formal gardens at Melbourne Hall, and one of the finest surviving Norman churches in England.
• Repton — Historic village on the Trent with its famous school and the Anglo-Saxon crypt beneath St Wildburgh's Church, one of the most important Saxon survivals in the country.
• The National Forest — Barrow upon Trent sits close to the northern edge of this 200-square-mile regeneration project spanning Derbyshire, Leicestershire and Staffordshire, with woodland trails and cycle routes opening up further south.

The village has two local pubs: The Brookfield, a village local serving pub meals, and The Crewe & Harpur, a 17th-century former coach house on the road between Swarkestone and Melbourne. For a wider choice, Melbourne and Derby both have a good range of independent cafes, restaurants and traditional pubs a short drive away.

Camping around Barrow upon Trent means using licensed sites in the surrounding South Derbyshire countryside rather than the riverbanks themselves. Wild camping without the landowner's permission is not legal in England, so pitching up unofficially along the Trent or the Trent and Mersey Canal towpath is not an option, however tempting the water meadows might look. Fortunately the wider area, sitting as it does on the northern edge of the National Forest, has a reasonable spread of small farm campsites, caravan parks and glamping operations within a short drive of the village, many aimed at exactly the kind of quiet, low-key countryside stay that this part of Derbyshire is suited to.

The flat terrain of the Trent Valley makes for easy, gentle camping country rather than the rugged pitches of the Peak District further north. Sites tend to be set among farmland, orchards or paddocks, with the river, the canal towpath and country parks like Elvaston within comfortable cycling or walking distance. The ground here is genuinely low-lying and can turn soft after wet weather, so an early-season pitch is worth checking with the site owner if the weather has been poor. Some fields also flood in the depths of winter, which is part of why most sites in the area operate on a seasonal basis.

Late spring through to early autumn is the best window for camping here, when the meadows are dry underfoot, the days are long enough for proper exploring, and the hedgerows and riverside paths are at their best. Midsummer weekends near Derby and the more popular National Forest attractions can get busy, so booking ahead is sensible if you have a particular site in mind. For a more comfortable option, several nearby farms and rural businesses offer glamping in shepherd's huts, pods or bell tents, which suit anyone wanting the setting without the full kit, and are a good option for a short break rather than a longer stay.