They have never camped before and nor, for that matter, have either my husband or I (unless you count a rain-drenched Girl Guides’ weekend in the Peak District, longer ago than I care to remember!). Q. Our two boys, aged 10 and five, are mad keen to go on a camping holiday. Annie Lennox plus progeny are regulars, for example.Sample pricepounds 160 for a good sized double room (B and wonderful B) which can be shared with children on “zed beds” for no extra charge.Woolley Grange Hotel, Woolley Green, Bradford-on-Avon, Wiltshire, BA15 1TX Tel: 01225 864705 Fax: 01225 864059.. A lot of showbiz stars and other celebrities like to weekend here. Snacks and light meals also served in the conservatory.Fellow guestsMoneyed parents and their treasured sprogs. There are also bikes for use by guests, including a tandem.RefuellingLittle ‘uns can eat lunch and dinner in Woolley Bear’s Den for a fiver a meal.

Dinner in the main dining room is classier, with a daily-changing table d’hote menu. Bath is eight miles away.ActivitiesKids hang out in Woolley Bear’s Den, which is large, stuffed with toys, supervised daily by nannies, and free.There is a heated outdoor swimming pool, a grass tennis court, croquet, Nintendo, and a games rooms with table football, pool and air hockey (50p a throw for these, which is a touch irritating when you are already paying a fair whack). The real achievement of this hotel is to tread the line between keeping families happy in an age when children expect to be both seen and heard, and maintaining an informal sophisticated ambience. The owners have four children of their own.
AccommodationComfortable and unfussy. Twenty-three rooms of varying shapes and sizes with prices to match Fit in as many children as you like.

Some pairs of rooms can be turned into interconnecting suites.In the areaMedieval Bradford-on-Avon has twisting back streets, antique shops and a tiny Saxon church. The atmosphere is stylish, but lightened with subtle fripperies that banish any sense of stuffiness: comical Victorian iron animals hiding in nooks and crannies, or the Indian rickshaw in the garden. Mood

A Jacobean manor house set in 14 acres of lawn, vegetable garden and paddock. There are also restaurants on Ile aux Cerfs and one on Ilot Mangenie: 24-hour room service ensures you won’t starve after a midnight swimSports: include sailing, waterskiing, windsurfing, golf, horse-riding, scuba diving, game fishing, parasailing, leisurely swims.KEEPING IN TOUCHCommunications: Direct dial phones, teletext information system, satellite TV, fax, e-mail and a secretarial service all available, but after a day or so, contact with anything more than room service is too much of an effort.Facilities: A beauty salon, dispensary, florist, film processing, foreign exchange, several boutiques if you are having shopping withdrawl symptoms.THE BOTTOM LINEA standard double room, on half board basis, costs from MRs5,200 (Mauritian rupees) (pounds 130) to MRs10,050 (pounds 250) per day.I’m not paying that: You’ve come here to spend and be pampered honey – go Duchess and splash out on a Royal Suite (from MRs34,700 [pounds 875] per day).. Room decor is restrained, simple warm colours, huge beds, lounge area, and a terrace or a balcony.Bathrooms: Local wood, fluffy white bathrobes and towels and a scatter of hibiscus on arrival.Dining: Choose from four restaurants and three bars, all specialising in either French, Mauritian or Indian cuisine and with emphasis on seafood. Hotel has three wings – the Hibiscus, the Coral and the York (on an adjoining island with its own swimming pool).

Each wing also has several private beaches, all with waiter service. Nothing is a problem; someone was even sent from the hotel’s Indian restaurant to help fold me into a sari bought in the market in Port Louis.Rooms: 1101-1914 give the soothing impression of being surrounded by the sea and have spectacular views of merging sea and sky. It even has its own private islands, the Ilot Mangenie (for sun seekers) and the Ile aux Cerfs (for watersports) that you get to by water taxi.The main, village-style hotel is a mass of white-washed walls and shocking pink flowers. Despite its size, Le Touessrok is pleasantly quiet during the day – but it is popular as a honeymoon destination.LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATIONLe Touessrok Hotel, Trou d’Eau Douce, Mauritius (00 230 419 2451/fax 00 230 419 2025)Local transport: Primary idea behind most luxury resorts is that you never have to leave, but it only takes an hour or so to drive anywhere on the island, so it’s worth seeing the sights.International flights: The Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolan International Airport is 46km away and the hotel can set up taxis or, for the more ostentatious, helicopter transfers.ARE YOU LYING COMFORTABLY?There’re 200 rooms and suites, from standard to plush York and Princess suites, and, yes they did come here for their honeymoon. First found, uninhabited, by the Arabs in 975AD the island became a republic in 1968 after three centuries of colonial – Dutch (blamed for killing off its famous dodo), Portuguese, French and, from 1810, the British – French brought sugar and slaves, British indentured labour from India, whose descendants make up 70 per cent of today’s population.
Once pirates and bounty hunters terrorised the island’s waters – hijacking British trading ships – but these days it’s mainly wealthy tourists bound for its most exclusive hotel.Le Touessrok nestles on the east coast so close to the ocean it’s virtually paddling in the surf.