AN INSPECTOR CALLS

He pays his way... and tells it like it is

WALTON HALL is a grand Georgian house on a 27-acre lake near Wakefield in the West Riding of Yorkshire. It stands on an island reached by a pedestrian bridge — and it’s quite the setting.

Several rooms are in the hall, others are in Waterton Park Hotel on the mainland, a grim modern structure. This is where I’m staying, my room reached via a series of twisty corridors, fire doors and staircases.

It’s a big room crying out for a redesign. I haven’t come across tinny bedside lamps for ages, ones which you tap to turn on, tap again to make it brighter and again to make brighter still. An ironing board is propped up in a corner; there are two wing-back chairs, a four-poster bed and a brochure advertising weddings.

Walton Hall is where the naturalist Charles Waterton lived — and was buried in 1865 between two oak trees. Sir David Attenborough has described him as a pioneer in protecting the natural world.

New owners recently have taken over and there are plans to move the bar and restaurant out of the hall and into the modern building. For now, you eat and drink at Charlie’s Bar near the indoor pool, accompanied by the whiff of chlorine.

Even so, I enjoy my pork tenderloin; and the staff, some of them refreshingly elderly, are warm and friendly.

You can’t charge anything to your room. You pay as you go. On asking why, I’m told in a frank Yorkshire sort of way: ‘To stop people walking off without paying.’

The new owners will need deep pockets. Knocking down the hotel part and starting again might be a good option. A site like this deserves a big investment.