Hotels in Cotswolds

The single most important decision in the Cotswolds is where to put your base, because the region is far larger than most visitors expect and the lanes between villages are slow. A stay in the north, around Broadway, Chipping Campden, Stow-on-the-Wold or Moreton-in-Marsh, puts you within twenty minutes of the classic villages and the best-known walks. A stay in the south, around Cirencester, Tetbury or Painswick, gives you quieter roads, Roman history and easier access to Bath. Trying to cover both from one hotel means a lot of driving.

Couples generally do best in the small villages: Upper Slaughter, Blockley, Guiting Power and Stanton have manor-house hotels and old coaching inns where the appeal is a fire, a good dinner and no through traffic after dark. Broadway sits between the two, polished enough for a treat weekend but with a village high street you can walk in the evening.

Families are usually better served by the market towns, where there is somewhere to buy an ice cream and something to do when it rains, or by the Cotswold Water Park around South Cerney, where lakeside lodges and self-catering give you swimming and flat cycling. Walkers should look hard at Chipping Campden, the start of the Cotswold Way, or at Winchcombe, which sits on both the Cotswold Way and the Winchcombe Way and has an unusually good cluster of pubs with rooms.

On price, expect a country-house hotel to start around 200 to 250 pounds a night for a double, a good inn with rooms nearer 120 to 180, and a village bed and breakfast from around 90. Rates rise sharply from June to August and over bank holidays, and many of the smaller places have a two-night minimum at weekends year round. Book three to four months ahead for summer weekends, longer if you want a specific room in one of the well-known manor houses. Midweek in October or February, the same rooms can be half the price and the villages are yours.