Simonstone Hall
Hawes, Yorkshire
Good Hotel Guide Review
‘The place breathes class,’ says a Guide inspector of Jake Dinsdale’s Jacobean-style country house, set high in the Yorkshire Dales on the Pennine Way. Built in the 17th century and remodelled in the early 19th, it is family-friendly, dog-friendly and relaxed. ‘I thought it would be rather stuffy,’ wrote a reader, ‘but now we’ve stayed there I highly recommend it.’ Traditional-style, newly refurbished bedrooms range from cosy to grand, with good antiques. A four-poster room had ‘a spotless, spacious, modern bathroom’ with good toiletries, ‘peafowl-pattern roman blinds’. By day there is a grazing menu, while in the restaurant, at lunch and dinner, a ‘tempting menu’ brings dishes such as ‘a delicate crab and peach salad; rich, savoury rigatoni’. At breakfast there are new-laid eggs from the hens, smoked haddock Florentine. Our inspector waxed lyrical: ‘To sit on a sunlit evening, sipping excellent Forest gin (one for connoisseurs) in beautiful gardens, with an uninterrupted view of the Dales, while admiring iridescent peacock plumage, is to get as near to heaven as is possible on this earth.’ (Jill Fossdyke)
Hotel details
Address
Simonstone
Hawes
Yorkshire
DL8 3LY
England
Telephone
01969 667255
Bedrooms
20. 2 on ground floor suitable for disabled.
Open
all year.
Facilities
bar, restaurant, 3 lounges, in-room TV, civil wedding licence, 2½-acre grounds (hot tub), EV charging, public rooms wheelchair accessible, adapted toilet.
Background music
‘low key’ in public areas.
Children
all ages welcomed, extra bed for under-13s £40, for 13–16s £80.
Dogs
welcomed in some bedrooms (1 dog £25 per stay, 2 dogs £35), 2 lounges, bar.
Credit cards
MC, Visa.
Prices
B&B doubles from £149. Set-price dinner £50 (£44 for pre-booked residents). 1-night bookings usually refused on public holidays.
Information from the 2022 Good Hotel Guide.