Le Val d'Amblève

Check-in happens at a hotel split across two buildings on the edge of Stavelot, in the Ardennes valley. The main house holds four rooms, including the suite, plus two meeting rooms; a residence 25 metres away holds the other fourteen, along with a sauna and steam room added in a renovation four years ago. Rooms mix warm colours with rich materials and come with flat-screen televisions and proper bathrooms. It is a compact stay. A separate villa, Le Jardin des Princes, sits about 300 metres off, reachable by a footpath behind the hotel or by car, with six rooms of its own and a small upstairs sitting room for coffee or tea. The restaurant opens onto a garden and terrace, weather allowing, and runs on French cuisine built around fresh, seasonal, largely regional produce, with a la carte, tasting and set menus through lunch and dinner. A private dining room called The Festival takes groups of twenty or more, and the whole restaurant can be booked for banquets up to around 120. Upstairs, a roof terrace looks over the Stavelot valley, and the sauna and hammam give the place a quiet, workaday sort of wellness. Dogs are welcome in most rooms for a nightly surcharge, and parking sits close to every building on site. The hotel closes each year from mid-December to mid-January.