Garstang Hotels

Garstang boasts a wide range of hotels for its guests.

Brooklands Country Retreat and Health Spa is a privately owned, nineteenth century house. The retreat also has a gate house from the nineteenth century. Gatehouses were built to protect the main house, be it a castle or a manor house. When castles were the in thing, gate houses were surrounded by moats and drawbridges so that intruders could not get near the main castle. Brooklands’ Gatehouse was built in the nineteenth century and by this time they were becoming a place of decoration. Although initially built to protect, at the end of the Middle Ages, gatehouses were becoming structures of welcome. In England and France especially, where they were built as grand entrances of welcome.

Another one of the many hotels around Garstang is Crofters Hotel. Although today, we see Crofters Hotel being shortlisted for Lancashire Small Hotel of the Year, 2009/10, back in 1949, things were a bit different. Crofters was initially a transport cafe, where drivers would come for a break, get something to eat and then continue on their journey. Now we see Service Stations on the motorways and we stop there when we need food, petrol or a break, but before that, all kinds of drivers would stop at a transport cafe.

Garstang Country Hotel and Golf Centre is another popular hotel around the Garstang area. In the same family since the seventeenth century, the land was originally used for farming before the owners decided to build the Golf Centre and later the Hotel.

The Priory is a family owned business. It has been in the Collinson family for forty years. Before it was turned into a hotel, it was a tea room. Back in the nineteenth century, there was cotton mill in Scorton, the small village where The Priory is now situated. There was also a railway station from 1841 until 1939, on the West Coast Main Line. The village has been a popular stop over for centuries. Before trains and cars, in the days of horses and carriages, people travelling from London to Scotland stopped in the accommodating village to take a break.

The Royal Oak Hotel is another family run business in Garstang. The Hotel has been in the same family since 1983 and also holds a seventeenth century coaching inn. The hotel was Garstang’s Principal Posting House for those who travelled on the London to Edinburgh route. Some of the famous people to have stopped at the hotel are Sir Walter Scott, the Scottish poet and novelist. Also Celia Fiennes, the famous female traveller who is regarded as the first woman to visit every country in England. It was in the seventeenth century when coaching inns became an important part of England’s transport infrastructure. Travellers would stop over for a meal and accommodation and then be off on their way to complete their journey. So whenever travellers would either be travelling to London via Edinburgh or Edinburgh via London, they would stop at the Royal Oak Hotel. The hotel was also used for community gatherings and it is said that if you have a look, you can see marks of coach wheels on the cornerstone to the right of the hotel.