Coombe Abbey promises “a unique experience”; I won’t argue with that. Five miles east of Coventry, across a 500-acre country park, the hotel, built around a 12th-century Cistercian monastery, looms beyond a medieval-looking moat.

In an ideal world, mist would be swirling and bats swooping, but it’s merely drizzling in a West Midlands sort of way. Inside, my wife and I follow a dark corridor lined by spotlit Roman busts, and cross a candlelit pseudo-chapel where a stone bishop reclines on a tomb and soft organ music plays.

As we pass a suit of armour on the staircase, a man calls up from the bar: “It’s Hogwarts, darling, perfectly Hogwarts!” Spot on. Coombe, run by a company aptly called No Ordinary Hotels, is so riotously camp-Gothic that, with a wizard or two drafted in, it would provide a perfect set for a Harry Potter film.

Staff dress in doublet and hose, or, just occasionally, as monks; the call-waiting music is Gregorian chant; the public telephone booths look like confession boxes; and a black cat stalks the vaulted foyer. He’s called Reggie, which is a bit of a let-down, but it may cover something more sinister.

Our comfortable “bedchamber”, one of 83, has a fourposter and is piled high with old books. The bathroom is niftily hidden behind a false bookcase, with one or two collectable volumes tragically chopped down to fit the shelves. There are, needless to say, ghosts, but none troubled us.

Almost as needless to say, Coombe hosts medieval banquets. They promise a welcome from “peasants from lands around the Abbey” and a menu including Baron’s Broth and Royal Ribs. Bring your own pig’s bladder, my lord.

Our dinner is more discriminating: perfectly judged sweet pea soup and curry-spiced cod, let down by a rather bland vegetable moussaka. Service is friendly and without fuss, with several more mature members of staff to reassure older guests that life in catering doesn’t end at 23.

The hotel, whose glossy house magazine shows the supermodel Rachel Hunter draping herself and her underwear across plush armchairs, is handily placed for the area’s major centres of history and/or heritage. Warwick is 30 minutes’ drive away, with Stratford-upon-Avon about 40. Don’t neglect Coventry, though; it has more to offer visitors as every month goes by.

Failing Harry Potter, Coombe Abbey would suit an over-the-top film of an M. R. James ghost story. Well, actually, what it really suits is American tourists with a taste for kitsch. It is, after all, so perfectly “English”.

Bottom line: Doubles from £155 (room only). Breakfast £13.50.

Sampling the fare: Three-course dinner (with coffee): £32.50.

Access all areas: Some wheelchair-friendly rooms; restaurant and bar accessible.

Need to know: Coombe Abbey, Brinklow Road, Binley, Coventry (024-7645 0450, www.coombeabbey.com).

Room: 8 out of 10.
Food: 7 out of 10.
Service: 9 out of 10.

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