Six miles from Plymouth, an Elizabethan manor house with an award-winning spa in the grounds. Full of character, the original building retains its oak panelling, ornate ceilings, mullioned windows and stone archways. The fine-dining Gallery restaurant overlooks the beamed Great Hall, which features a coat of arms of King James I above an enormous stone fireplace. Accommodation ranges from the majestic, with four-poster beds, to more contemporary rooms situated in the courtyard and stable wings. Gaia spa has a pool, hydrotherapy pool, steam rooms and saunas, a relaxation room, gym and a salon with a wide choice of beauty treatments.

In Plympton St Maurice, on the edge of the city, this Georgian manor was once a convent. Now a hotel and events venue, tranquillity remains in calming, modern bedrooms and in the surrounding nine acres of gardens and sweeping lawns. Local and regionally sourced produce appears on the restaurant’s fine dining menus: perhaps curried white crab with pea panna cotta, pink grapefruit and fresh pea shoots; Tournedos Rossini – fillet of Devon beef on crispy crouton with chicken liver parfait, dauphinoise potato, wild mushroom and baby onion jus.