The rarest luxury is a night without a sound

Quiet is the advantage hotels claim most casually and deliver least often. A brochure can call any place peaceful; the test comes at two in the morning, when the delivery lorry reverses into the yard, the wedding party moves to the pool bar or the road beyond the hedge fills with commuters. Genuine quiet is a matter of geography and management. The property sits at the end of its own lane rather than on a through road, the buildings are placed so that plant rooms and kitchens face away from the bedrooms, and the house rules keep music indoors after a set hour.

Before booking, ask what lies within two hundred metres of the room: a road, a flight path, a ferry terminal, a nightclub, a school. Ask how many rooms the hotel has and how weddings and groups are handled. Ask whether windows are double glazed and which side of the building your room is on. A hotel that answers precisely has thought about the question already.