La Sablonnerie

A horse-drawn carriage conveys you over a dramatic, narrow isthmus 80 metres above the sea to this 17th-century farmhouse on a tiny island with no airstrip, no tarmac road and no cars. Since she was in her mid-twenties, the ‘charming and charismatic’ Elizabeth Perrée has run a hotel begun in 1948 by her family with just three guest bedrooms. Now she presides over 22 rooms, spread over the main house and surrounding cottages. Her motto is ‘nothing is impossible, and everything must be tickety-boo’, and everything is indeed tickety-boo, but in a very ‘traditional and charming’ way. That means ‘quaintly old-fashioned rooms’ with fringed lamps, floral curtains and fresh cut flowers (indeed, we have readers who have been coming here for more than 50 years). You can eat in the rustic, whitewashed dining room, or in the rose-filled garden, among the brimming flower borders. Dishes might include fillet of Sark beef, hand-dived scallops or ‘the most amazing lobster’, always a vegetarian option or two. Days can be spent cycling, sea-fishing, scuba diving and puffin-spotting off 
white sandy beaches, while the night sky is something to behold.