Take a pottery or painting class together before a restorative massage and a swim in the outdoor pool. The Tawny’s beautifully designed treehouses, shepherd’s huts and boathouses all have an outdoor spa bath and are scattered amid 70 acres of rewilded woodland with its own folly trail. It borders an RSPB reserve.

Shepherd’s hut for two from £265 a night, B&B (thetawny.co.uk).

Spring comes early to Cornwall but even if it’s blustery, you can warm yourself in the hotel’s outdoor hot tubs, scenically positioned over the beach at Mawgan Porth. This adults-only bolthole has a superb spa, including a relaxation room with suspended cocoon pods. Rooms are Scandi-chic and the Atlantic is on show through picture windows everywhere.

B&B doubles from £265 a night (scarlethotel.co.uk).

It might be a converted chapel, but this place is made for fun, with a helter-skelter slide between floors and a games room. You can also rent canoes from the outfit downstairs for a paddle down the Wye. Although most of the beds are in bunks, they’re contemporary and chic, like the rest of the property.

Three-night weekends for 18 from £1,920 (groupaccommodation.com).

Where better to stay to appreciate spring at its finest than this gardener’s house within a four-acre walled garden? In the grounds of Floors Castle, the two-bedroom cottage was built in 1815 and has been beautifully renovated. Guests have private use of the garden once the castle is closed, with walks in the park grounds.

Four nights for four from £825 (crabtreeandcrabtree.com).

You’re spoilt for choice for walks from the door when you stay in one of these modern self-catering cottages near Grasmere. Visit Beatrix Potter’s house and cross Windermere by ferry to admire its famous daffodils. Back at base, if you’re too tired to cook, the bistro will deliver food to your door.

A week for a family of four from £1,297 (theyan.co.uk).

Wine expert Oz Clarke says this vineyard is special, and he’s right: as well as producing delicious wine, it has its own restaurant and five self-catering lodges designed by Will Hardie of TV’s Amazing Spaces. They are themed on different stages in a vine’s lifespan; pink-hued Budburst has murals in the main bedroom of blossoming vines.

From £260 for four a night (ashlingpark.co.uk).

Enjoy a slice of the countryside in the heart of the city at this hotel with a two-acre rooftop garden. Some 29 contemporary-styled rooms have direct garden access, where flowers line the walkways. When it’s nippy, retreat to the rooftop conservatory with wrap-around glass windows. The Royal Botanic Gardens are a short walk away.

Rooftop doubles from £206 a night (theglasshousehotel.co.uk).

You’re unlikely to find a better-equipped big house rental than this elegant manor, where all ten bedrooms have ensuites and with everything you need in the capacious kitchen. As well as a gym, heated outside pool and tennis court, it has a magical lost kingdom theme park next door; guests get free entry when it re-opens in April.

Three-night weekends for 20 from £4,400 (kateandtoms.com).

Nothing says springtime like frolicking lambs and when you stay in one of the family-friendly cottages at Millmoor Farm, you can visit the lambing shed and help bottle feed some newborns. There are eggs to be collected, calves to feed and goats to pet, not to mention miles of rolling Cheshire countryside to explore.

A week for four from £516 (millmoorfarm.co.uk).

Take the book club on an outing to Agatha Christie’s holiday home, filled with her memorabilia and surrounded by gardens and woodland. Stay in the apartment on the first and second floors of her home, or in one of the lodges in the grounds, including the thatched cottage with climbing roses by the Dart estuary.

Two nights in apartment for eight from £824 (nationaltrust.org.uk).

After walkies in the Yorkshire Dales, return to a hot outdoor bath (for four-legged guests) and time in the spa (for two-legged ones). Everyone can dine on good, traditional food in the brasserie (there is a Canine Delights menu), before snuggling down in their own four-poster bed.

B&B doubles from £225 a night, dogs £15 with optional four-poster £35 (devonshirehotels.co.uk).

Pub stays don’t get much better than this characterful country inn on the edge of the Fonthill Estate, with its farmland and formal gardens. Tuck into delicious but unusual pub grub, then climb the stairs to one of eight simple but stylish rooms. For a treat, book the estate’s beautifully decorated historic arch.

B&B doubles from £130 a night, arch from £295 for four (beckfordarms.com).