Best Of

Best Staycations with a Pool UK

A swimming pool elevates a staycation from a pleasant break to something approaching a resort experience. In the UK — where outdoor swimming is a seasonal gamble at best — an indoor pool is a genuine luxury, and a heated outdoor pool bordered by countryside is close to perfection. The properties on this list offer both. You will find grand country house hotels with elegant indoor pools beneath vaulted ceilings, coastal retreats with infinity pools overlooking the sea, and rural estates where the outdoor pool sits in a walled garden, sheltered from the wind and open to the sky. Some of these pools are Olympic-length affairs; others are intimate plunge pools designed for a few quiet lengths before breakfast. What unites them is the quality of the experience around the pool: the changing rooms, the loungers, the towels, and the general sense that swimming here is a pleasure, not an afterthought. For families, a pool can be the difference between a holiday and an ordeal. For couples, it offers a shared activity that requires almost no effort. For solo travellers, early morning lengths in an empty pool remain one of the great small luxuries of travel.