‘In a small village in a valley, surrounded by forest walks’, Annabel and Stephen Thomas’s 16th-century country house is ‘ideal for guests wishing to holiday with their four-legged friend’.

Cocooned in ‘lovely, peaceful grounds in glorious countryside’, Jean-Pierre Mifsud’s ‘welcoming’ Victorian country house hotel continues to offer an enjoyable bucolic break.

Embedded firmly in the Wye valley, Chris and Kirsty Harrod’s Michelin-starred restaurant-with-rooms again delighted readers’ taste buds in 2018.

‘A great base for exploring,’ Richard Ireton and Sarah Hudson’s ‘pleasing, white-painted coaching inn’ stands overlooking an old stone bridge across the River Monmow, while ‘behind it, green hills gently rise’.

With Tal-y-llyn lake practically in the back garden, Cadair Idris behind, and ‘some of the finest walks in any national park’, Alex Yorke and Lorraine Hinkins’s Snowdonia B&B wins praise again this year.

‘Welcoming hosts’ David and Beverley Harrison-Wood collect praise for their ‘very friendly, well-presented guest house’.

Amid sheep-dotted fields, this red brick Victorian vicarage is run as a ‘heart-warming’ rural guest house. Helen and Tim Withers are liked for their ‘friendly efficiency’ and ‘dedication to quality’.

‘As good as ever’, this ‘delightful’ small hotel occupies an 18th-century stone dower house (once the home of Sir Wilfrid Thesiger), in extensive grounds leading to the River Teme.

Visitors to this ‘glossy luxury B&B’ are met with ‘an unexpected wow factor, as you walk through the door’.