‘We couldn’t have enjoyed it more or been more welcome,’ write trusted Guide correspondents this year, after dropping by at Keith Makepeace’s long-established, family-run hotel overlooking National Trust coastline and sea. ‘Excellent in almost every respect,’ agreed a Guide regular in 2018. ‘The staff were well trained, pleasant and helpful.’ Bedrooms (‘comfortable and well appointed’) look over cove or countryside, with glass doors on to a private furnished patio. ‘The setting is gorgeous, and the building well maintained, old-fashioned in the best possible way.’ By day, a café offers the likes of crab baguette, Soar Bay lobster. ‘The delicious seafood chowder was packed with the freshest shellfish.’ By night, in the restaurant, long-standing chef Ian MacDonald creates such dishes as heritage beetroot tarte Tatin; day-boat bream with Provençal mussels, clams, basil oil. Readers had some niggles, however, including the ‘high mark-up on wine by the glass’. Breakfast brings Salcombe mackerel smokies, Aune Valley pork sausages, gammon, sauté potatoes – fuel for walking the South West Coastal Path. (Desmond and Jenny Balmer)