Castle View

There can’t have been much debate when it came to choosing a name for this large self-catering property on the Northumberland coast. The iconic Bamburgh Castle looms large from the front door, the rear deck and some of the bedrooms, too. Castle View is simply the closest holiday home to the fortress and within easy walking distance of everything else that Bamburgh has to offer as well. For a small Northumberland village, that’s rather a lot: three miles of sand, a great seafood restaurant, pubs, tea rooms, quaint streets – and a cricket pitch! It’s all this that led readers of Which? to vote Bamburgh as the best seaside destination in the UK for three recent years in a row.

Given the option, they may well have voted Castle View as the best holiday home here, too. It offers self-catering accommodation with the style and sophistication of a boutique hotel, sleeping up to 16 in eight en-suite bedrooms. Each is decorated with a soft, seaside style. Soothing blues and yellows sit alongside natural shades of wood and wicker with the occasional seashell, beach hut or rope motif. It’s all modern and well put together. Each bedroom has a Smart TV and a hairdryer, six of the en-suite bathrooms have a rainforest shower, and two have roll-top baths.

Downstairs, the contemporary seaside style continues in the lounge, which is separated from the open-plan kitchen-dining room by a partition wall with a big screen and a modern electric fire. It’s all light and bright with white walls, plenty of windows and a roof lantern – but it’s warm as well. There’s underfloor heating for the flagstone floors, a range cooker and a long rustic, wooden dining table with comfortable chairs. The kitchen is as well-equipped as you could wish for, with a coffee machine and ice maker alongside enough usual kitchen kit you need to cater for up to 16.

Outside, the deck gives you enough space for everyone to sit and enjoy a barbecue under the gaze of the 1,400-year-old castle which sits on a crag between you and the sea. A visit to explore it is a must while you’re here, and so is a trip to the RNLI’s Grace Darling Museum, just two doors away. And then, of course, there’s the beach, which at Bamburgh is a good one – vast, sandy and, like the house, dog-friendly. But there are more nearby if you can drag yourself away to Seahouses or Beadnell, plus boat trips to the Farne Islands or Lindisfarne. There are also other castles – Alnwick, half an hour away, is tempting to visit not just for the castle but the town, too. But it's not quite as tempting as the one that’s just outside your front door.