Competition

Win a hotel night

The letters that we receive from our readers are the life blood of the Guide. To mark the start of the the annual task researching the next edition, we are launching a competition to encourage more people to write to us. The best review each month will receive a night in one of the Guide's favourite hotels with dinner, a bottle of wine and breakfast thrown in. The Traddock at Austwick in the Yorkshire Dales, a hotel run by the Reynolds family for two generations, has kindly offered the first monthly prize. All you need do to enter is to go to the GHG website and select 'Send a Review'. Your report will be judged by the GHG's editorial team. It doesn't have to be about a place already in the Guide. We encourage comments about promising hotels, guest houses, inns and B&Bs which might qualify for a future edition.

The Guide's reputation for reliability is due to the fact that we track the views and opinions of our correspondents. Unlike TripAdvisor, we know where they are coming from. That enables us to screen out collusive or unfair reports. We don't always get it right, but with the help of our inspectors, we try hard to do so. And when we get it wrong, our readers soon let us know. The great majority of our selected hotels understand that this is an independent guide that doesn't just gush praise. But a few find criticism, of even the mildest kind, hard to take.Anyone with a taste for confrontation will enjoy emails sent by a hotel in Scotland, the Loch Ness Lodge. Others, who prefer a quieter life, may learn a bit about how we operate, and the fact that we don't respond to ultimatums.

Adam Raphael

Special offers

Web winner

The most viewed hotel on the Good Hotel Guide's website is the Star Castle at St Mary's in the Scilly Islands. In the past year, nearly 9,000 people have looked at its entry. What makes this hotel so popular? It helps that it won a César award for Island Hotel of the Year in 2009. It also advertises a special offer on the home page. But that in my view doesn't explain its appeal. The Scillies are a long way away and the journey via helicopter is expensive. I can only guess that our readers want to dream their dreams and are happy to pay for it.

Another popular hotel on the website is Combe House at Gittisham which won a César award for Country House Hotel of the Year in 2007. It has put up a three-nights-for-two special offer on the home page, and is also listed on the home page as one of the Editor's top ten choices for the West Country.

The third most looked at hotel is Hambleton Hall, another country house hotel, which won a César award as far back as 1985, and which also advertises on the home page a special mid-week offer of £132.50 per person, a bargain for this top class hotel. What lessons do I draw from this? Not every hotel can be an award winner--and, rightly, as the Guide's marketing director, I am kept well away from such sensitive editorial decisions. But at the risk of sounding self-serving, I believe special offers are an important way of attracting guests in these tough times. The special offers that appeal to me personally are the off-beat ones such as Carlton Riverside's sliding old-age discount. The older you are, the cheaper it is. If you get to 100, you can stay for free! That is as good as a telegram from the Queen.

Hotels, inns and B&Bs with special offers (click and see)

European hotels

A happy return

We are delighted that we have started to recommend hotels in mainland Europe once again. The first twenty hotels are already up in our new European selection on the website. Already we have selections in France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland. Please have a look by Clicking here. We have begun slowly with a few personal favourites, such as Ca'n Reus in Mallorca(pictured above). But we hope readers will also nominate their own favourite hotels in Europe so that we can gradually build up the numbers. That is the way the Good Hotel Guide began 33 years ago when Hilary Rubinstein, a literary agent, asked his friends to nominate their favourite hotel. Please help us get this exciting project off the ground. The more feedback we get from our readers, the more reliable and comprehensive our selection will be. We are looking for exactly the same characterics we use to select hotels in Britain and Ireland. Small family-run hotels which provide a warm welcome, excellent food, and good rooms in a great location. Finding a perfect hotel for a holiday is not easy. Our new Continental Europe selection should help.

Hotel Tales

Basil Fawlty

1. Because the website claims that all rooms have a mountain view, we did not specifically request this when booking. We were given a room with no view, but when I dared to question the owner he became extraordinarily hostile. We chose not to stay a second night, but were forced to pay for it in full.

2. The bedroom had drink stains down the walls. In the bathroom, horrid blue vertical blinds hid the hideous view of rooftops. Breakfast was served in the bedroom in the manner you would expect in a care home.

3. At breakfast the ‘fresh fruit selection’ was a green apple plonked on the tray. As to the tea: the cup (round) did not match the saucer (square) and was cracked, so the tea soon started to leak out.

4. The water was not hot enough for a decent bath. The light in the wardrobe was supposed to go off, but didn’t: it went on and off of its own accord throughout the night, so that an intermittent band of light disturbed our sleep.

BUY tHE gUIDE

Plan that spring break

The 2010 edition of the Good Hotel Guide to Great Britain and Ireland is crucial in planning your next weekend break. Discount vouchers worth a total of £150 are included with each copy. They enable a 25% saving off the normal B&B price at participating hotels. A copy of the Guide costs £17.50 (including £2.50 p&p), compared to a retail price of £20.

Click here to buy now!

The Good Hotel Guide, founded 32 years ago, is totally independent. It receives no payments, no hospitality and no advertising from hotels selected for an entry in the printed edition. Hotels pay to be on the GHG website, but only those hotels which have an entry in the printed Guide are invited to appear on the website. Some of our selected hotels also buy copies of the printed Guide from us. Selected hotels are recommended by readers, backed where necessary by an anonymous inspection. The British edition of the Guide is published each autumn. Adam and Caroline Raphael, who edit the Guide, are award-winning journalists. Caroline, a former BBC researcher and a travel writer, is editor-in-chief. She has worked on the Guide for more than 30 years. Adam, who previously worked for the Guardian, the Observer, the BBC and the Economist, is the Guide's marketing director. Desmond Balmer, formerly travel editor of the Observer, is editor of the British guide. The Guide specialises in small owner-managed hotels, inns and B&Bs in England, Scotland, Wales, the Channel Islands and Ireland. It includes budget B&Bs, good value hotels as well as grand country houses and chic city hotels, all offering value for money in their price.range.