‘A very special place.’ ‘Utterly charming.’ ‘It’s not the Ritz, but you will feel like a lord.’ Lavish and frequent praise in 2019 for Wendy and Simon Bennett’s Victorian fantasy castle in the Eden valley. ‘Simon, Wendy and the team have provided a place with a magical feel that draws you in and asks you to stay for longer.’ Bedrooms are filled with antiques, and abound in character. Castle rooms, most with four-poster, have views to the Yorkshire Dales and Lakeland Fells, perhaps a brightly burning fire. The Gatehouse occupies an entire tower. Annexe rooms have their own garden. A reader, hosting guests for a birthday house party, relates: ‘Every one of them came back from their first visit to their room with the same excited look of appreciation.’ The ‘superb’ dinner is a social affair, taken communally. New ‘Umbria meets Cumbria’ menus include such dishes as wild mushroom lasagne; Tuscan slow-roasted lamb shank with tomato and olives. Sunday night is pizza night. The atmosphere is pure fun, with roaring fires, squashy sofas, honesty bar and ‘legendary’ home-made cake. Children can feed the hens and collect the eggs for breakfast. (Maurice Hall, Liz Saunders, and many others)