Standing right on the quay overlooking estuary and salt marshes, in a coastal village of flint cottages, gift shops and galleries, Emma Stannard’s hotel is ideal for outdoorsy family holidays.

‘A lovely, family-friendly hotel,’ was Guide inspectors' verdict on this 16th-century stone manor house with spa in beautiful grounds, ‘looking out over rolling hills’.

A Welsh rarebit on the tip of Cardigan Bay, this ‘lovely, wacky’ hotel is a family-friendly, family-run affair.

On an island of white-sand beaches and rocky inlets (human population 135; seals, otters and eagles unnumbered), Jane and Alex Howard’s 18th-century inn sits at the centre of village life, with quiz nights and live music.

In a hillside location with ‘stunning sea views’, this supremely family-friendly hotel has something for everyone – indeed, everything for everyone.

Up 137 steps, through ‘glorious’ gardens, ‘one of the most comfortable establishments I’ve ever stayed in’ occupies a higgle piggle of houses with ‘extraordinary views’ across Falmouth Bay.

Once used to billet D-Day troops, this revamped early 17th-century mansion now hosts ‘young children, exhausted parents’ and grandparents.

A Victorian baroque showstopper, this manor house stands on a steep hill in gardens above the Fowey estuary. It is part of the Luxury Family Hotels group.

We hear a perennial chorus of approval from fans of Wendy and Simon Bennett’s family-friendly Victorian fantasy castle in the Eden valley, between Lake District and Yorkshire Dales.