Luxury spa days in the Lake District with a view

The consensus

Gilpin Hotel & Lake House is a family-run, AA Five Red Star, Relais & Châteaux property near Windermere, holding Two MICHELIN Keys and home to the Michelin-starred SOURCE restaurant alongside the more casual Gilpin Spice. Its private Spa Suites and Spa Lodges each come with their own sauna, jacuzzi and steam room, and the Jetty Spa Experience package pairs a treatment with private pool use; classic bedrooms start from around £295 a night in summer, with Spa Suites from around £890. TripAdvisor rates it 4.7 out of 5 across close to 2,500 reviews, and the independent Good Hotel Guide covers it favourably too — the overwhelming majority of feedback is glowing on welcome, staff and setting. It isn't flawless, though: a small number of more recent reviews describe an unwelcoming check-in experience, and a few guests have raised maintenance niggles or questioned value for money against the price, worth weighing against the otherwise strong consensus.

Sourced from TripAdvisor, Good Hotel Guide — how we rate venues

The consensus

Armathwaite Hall sits on a 400-acre estate on the shore of Bassenthwaite Lake near Keswick, dog-friendly throughout and built around a spa whose 16-metre infinity pool looks straight out over the lake to the fells beyond. Alongside the infinity pool, the spa runs to a hydrotherapy pool, sauna, aroma room, steam room and outdoor hot tub, and rooms start from around £211 a night. Both TripAdvisor and the independent Hotel Guru review are consistently positive, and the spa and its infinity-pool view are the single most repeated highlight across reviews — nothing resembling a significant, recurring complaint turned up in the review sampling here, which is unusual enough among spa hotels on this coast to be worth noting plainly rather than dressing up further. It's also one of the better-established venues on the voucher platforms, with packages listed directly through both Buyagift and Red Letter Days.

Sourced from TripAdvisor, The Hotel Guru

The consensus

Brimstone is a 16-suite, adults-only hotel forming part of the wider Langdale Estate near Ambleside, and it shares its Brimstone Spa facility with the neighbouring, larger Langdale Hotel & Spa. The spa itself is genuinely striking — a 9-metre indoor-outdoor swim-through pool, Finnish sauna, aroma steam room, laconium and ice room, with treatments using the estate's own Pure Alchemy products. One thing to flag plainly, since this guide is about spa days: Brimstone Spa isn't sold as a walk-in day pass to the public — access is exclusive to guests staying at Brimstone or elsewhere on the Langdale Estate, so this is a stay-and-spa venue rather than a drop-in one. TripAdvisor rates it highly, around 4 out of 5 across some 1,450-plus reviews as "Brimstone at Langdale," and Good Spa Guide lists it independently too. It isn't universally five-star, though — a handful of reviewers have questioned whether it's worth the price at this tier, and some have flagged slow service and a limited menu at the on-site restaurant.

Sourced from TripAdvisor, Good Spa Guide