Short stay: New Hall Hotel and Spa, Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham, UK

New Hall is the romantic castle, complete with water lilies floating on the moat, where you have always wanted to stay. There are more coats of arms, griffins, stone fireplaces, Norman French mottoes, crenelated towers, timber beams, cupola topped by a weather vane and mullioned-windows than you can shake a jousting lance at. Rumour has it that Charles ll stayed a night at New Hall as he fled from Roundhead forces during the English Civil War.

New Hall is probably the oldest inhabited moated house in England. Though through the ages and wars, the castle’s owners had an unfortunate habit of picking the wrong side. Not just for the Norman Conquest when William the Conqueror had owner Edwin of Mercia executed but also the for War of the Roses and the Civil War too. No surprise then that the ghost of a dandy cavalier in black velvet suit – and rocking an extravagant neck ruff – is allegedly said to walk the passages.

New Hall was spruced up…