Mr & Mrs Smith

Miss Smith is not easily pleased. In the 14 weeks she’s spent on earth, only a stuffed cat, and a rousing rendition of ‘The Wheels on the Bus’, accompanied by all the actions, have produced anything approximating a smile. But when we take her out of the car upon arrival at the St Moritz Hotel in Cornwall, she takes one look at the brilliant white buildings on either side of us and beams from ear to ear. Well, I suppose they are the colour of milk.

Overlooking the dramatic salty expanses of the Camel Estuary, the St Moritz Hotel looks at first glance as though a 1930s ocean liner has decided to dock a few metres inland and drop anchor in a palm grove. Its white-and-blue Modernist façade, studded with portholes and picture windows, may seem ready to set sail for the New World, but, thankfully, this recently built hotel is here to stay. It’s just as well. The nearby villages of Padstow and Rock, facing each other across the water a couple of coves down from St Moritz, may attract as many upmarket weekenders as Tuscany and Umbria combined, but the area has lacked any seriously great hotel accommodation.

After checking into our King Room, and working out the best place to set up Miss Smith’s cot – quickly produced by the well-drilled and super-friendly hotel staff – we decide to head outdoors to check out the Cornish coastal path, which winds its way to within a few feet of St Moritz’s gardens. What was originally intended as a ‘let’s just walk down and see the sea’ stroll very quickly turns into the sort of ramble that usually requires stiff boots and a warming flask of soup. Mrs Smith, on only her second visit to Cornwall, is quickly entranced by the dramatic coastline, and insists that we carry on walking beside spray-spewing rockfaces, along sandy, brack-strewn beaches and up through golden dunes until we’re within sight of Rock – a good 25 minutes from the warmth of the hotel.

Unused to carrying 15lb sprawled across my chest over several miles of uneven track, I am particularly glad to see the St Moritz again. Approaching it from the path, it seems impossibly welcoming; its windows and portholes all aglow in the swiftly deepening twilight. As St Moritz’s bar and restaurant are in a separate, art deco-inspired building from the hotel’s accommodation wing – and, therefore, out of baby-monitor range – we decide there’s little point in putting Miss Smith to bed. So we troop into the bar for our very first family drinking session – a pint of local Doombar bitter for me, a Tanqueray and tonic for Mrs Smith.

It is 9pm before we make it over to St Moritz’s restaurant and tuck the now-sleeping baby into a space beside the table. Sitting alongside the open kitchen, in which we can watch white-clad chefs chop and char a variety of fish and meats, we share a dozen Porthilly oysters before tucking into our respective rib-eye steak and oven-roasted cod. The unpretentious dishes here may not win any awards for innovation, but all are made with the freshest available local ingredients and are executed with aplomb.

By the time we work our way through the chocolate mousse sprinkled with Amaretti and down the last of the excellent merlot in our glasses, we both agree that this is fare that perfectly complements the hotel’s location. When you’ve been blown and battered by those ferocious winds that hammer at the north Cornish coast, the last thing you’re going to want is delicate fusion cuisine. The menu at the St Moritz errs towards the hearty with good reason.

The next morning, refreshed after the sort of delicious sleep you only attain after liberal dosings of salt-heavy sea air and lying on a mattress that seems to be made of marshmallow, we return to the restaurant for tea, toast and platefuls of egg, bacon and sausages. We’re parting ways today. I’m heading down towards Land’s End to join some friends on a Fat Hen wild-food foraging and cookery course, while Mrs Smith is meeting a former colleague for a day of short walks and long lunches in Rick Stein’s personal fiefdom of Padstow.

When I return that evening after scouring the beaches and hedgerows of southern Cornwall for things to boil up or add to frittatas – including, I’m afraid to say, tree fungus and sheets of seaweed – Mrs Smith is virtually purring with happiness. It’s not just due to the loud snores coming from the direction of the cot. She’s had a wonderful day. After a couple of glasses of wine and a chargrilled seabass at the Seafood Restaurant, she tells me, she handed the baby over to her friend and was able to indulge in a full-body massage in the St Moritz’s acclaimed Cowshed Spa. Lying prone amid all the flickering candles, earth-toned decor and soft music of the sanctuary-like space for one blissful hour was, she says, the most relaxing experience she’d had since that pregnancy test first came up positive.

As we’re no strangers to an evening in at the moment, part of me wonders whether we should buck the recent trend and head into Trebetherick or Rock for a pint – but it’s a very small part indeed. I’m too full of wort and weeds to bother with dinner, while Mrs Smith shows little inclination to move from the enormous bed on which she’s lying and watching the large flatscreen set into the wall. Our room – with its soothing decor, cosy furniture and inviting, Cowshed product-filled bathroom – provides all the allure we need. If this is how weekends are going to be from now on, I’ve got no problem with that.