Wiltshire, United Kingdom

The Great Bustard

Price per night from$125.86

Price information

If you haven’t entered any dates, the rate shown is provided directly by the hotel and represents the cheapest double room (inclusive of taxes and fees) available in the next 60 days.

Prices have been converted from the hotel’s local currency (GBP100.00), via openexchangerates.org, using today’s exchange rate.

Style

Handsome bustard

Setting

South of Stonehenge

The pub-with-rooms concept gets an upgrade at the Great Bustard, which enhances the traditional twosome with a restaurant and farm shop, too. It’s a well-feathered basecamp on the Great Durnford Estate, which supplies bountiful local produce, and menus at both dining spots take a seasonal, close-to-home approach. Swoop to nearby Salisbury or Stonehenge, before making country-chic rooms your love nest. And with aromatherapy treatments, many cosy corners and a leafy courtyard, you’ll happily be taken under its wing.

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A bottle of fizz

Facilities

Photos The Great Bustard facilities

Need to know

Rooms

10.

Check–Out

11am. Check-in, 2.30pm; both are flexible, subject to availability and an extra charge.

More details

Rates at the Great Bustard include à la carte breakfast, with dishes like scrambled eggs, buttery crumpets and fruit-topped chia-seed pudding.

Also

The ground-floor White Tailed Eagle room is suitable if you have reduced mobility; the pub and restaurant are accessible and have designated parking spaces.

At the hotel

Free WiFi throughout. In rooms: TV, Nespresso coffee machine, tea-making kit, free bottled water and local bath products.

Our favourite rooms

Each room at the Great Bustard nods to British birdlife, and nesting comes easy in the farmhouse-style spaces, which are kitted out in peppermint shades, with sisal rugs and antique furnishings. Flock to Avocet for its verdant views over the front lawn and flower-lined courtyard; lofty Cuckoo calls with its vaulted ceilings, and Ouzel rules the roost with its private balcony that overlooks the River Avon.

Packing tips

Opt for pieces with forgiving waistbands: the delicious food here will tempt even the most usually-restrained of diners.

Also

In the Osprey treatment room, holistic treatments, such as reflexology, aromatherapy facials and full-body massages, soothe with bespoke botanical products and garden-fresh herbal infusions.

Pet‐friendly

Pooches are welcome to stay in White Tailed Eagle and Nightingale for £25 a night, and can join you in the pub’s bar and courtyard, but the restaurant is for humans only. See more pet-friendly hotels in Wiltshire.

Children

Welcome. Most rooms can take a baby cot but there are no extra beds, so older kids will need their own room. Children’s menus are available and there’s a small playground in the garden.

Sustainability efforts

This green-minded restaurant with rooms celebrates hyper-local ingredients — most of it comes from the Great Durnford Estate — in its menus and farm shop.

Food and Drink

Photos The Great Bustard food and drink

Top Table

Make a beeline for one by the pub’s fireplace or in the leafy courtyard; the restaurant’s forest-green banquettes face the courtyard or bag a table by its large kitchen window. Bigger clans can gather in the dark-wood private dining room.

Dress Code

Casual country get-up flies at the pub; you might prefer something smarter for the polished restaurant.

Hotel restaurant

The Great Bustard is a pub, restaurant and farm shop with rooms. The contemporary restaurant pays homage to the bucolic surrounding area, with its plant-dotted interiors and garden-facing glass doors; the pub is traditional in spirit and its courtyard is the picturesque setting for alfresco meals. They all share the same menu: it’s Springbottom Farm steaks and wood-fired pizzas on Monday and Tuesday; from Wednesday to Saturday seasonal stand-outs might include Durnford venison with sunflower-seed pesto or hot smoked trout with salt-baked kohlrabi. But save room for Sunday’s trimmings-topped roasts and trad-English desserts (apple crumble, sticky toffee pudding…). The provenance-proud farm shop supplies Great Durnford Estate products — the grounds on which you’ll find the hotel — and you can stock up on pickles, preserves and fresh produce; early birds get day-starting brews and pastries, too.

Hotel bar

The bar puts a modern spin on a country pub, with its mirrored details, photographic prints and exposed bricks and beams. Settle in by the fireplace with an artisan ale or glass of owner-grown Otarda red wine from their Tuscan estate, or you could take flight with an Aviation (gin, crème de violette, lemon) or a Bloody Bustard (the staple tomato tipple with a sprinkle of lovage salt). The garden-facing courtyard is coloured by hydrangeas and lavender, and is primed for shaded sundowners.

Last orders

Breakfast is 7.30am–10am (8am–10.30am on weekends). Lunch is noon–2.30pm, Monday to Saturday; until 3pm, Sunday. Dinner is 6pm–9pm (until 9.30pm on Sunday). The bar pours until 10pm, Monday to Tuesday; 11pm, Wednesday to Saturday, and 10.30pm, Sunday.

Location

Photos The Great Bustard location
Address
The Great Bustard
Great Durnford
Salisbury
SP4 6AY
United Kingdom

You’ll find the Great Bustard between Stonehenge and Salisbury, near the River Avon in bucolic Wiltshire.

Planes

Southampton and Bournemouth’s airports are each under an hour away by road; London Heathrow Airport is a 90-minute drive. Staff can arrange transfers with a local taxi company.

Trains

Rail routes from London, Exeter and Portsmouth call at Salisbury station, which is a 15-minute taxi ride from the hotel.

Automobiles

You’ll want a set of wheels for cruising through the surrounding countryside, plus the New Forest and England’s south coast are under an hour’s drive away. There’s free parking at the hotel and electric-vehicle charging points; both are available on a first-come, first-served basis.

Other

Let the hotel know in advance if you’d prefer to chopper in and they can arrange landing on the estate.

Worth getting out of bed for

You’ll want to work up an appetite for the Great Bustard’s pub and restaurant, and a host of pastoral pursuits should do the trick. Lace up your boots for romps along the River Avon, which conclude at Iron-Age settlement Old Sarum, or through the Avon Valley and Grovely Wood. Twitchers will have a field day at wildlife-dotted Langford Lakes Nature Reserve or the family-friendly Hawk Conservancy, and staff can arrange stake-outs to spot the hotel’s eponymous bird.

For the full country effect, go fishing with Ratfyn for carp and pike on Bulford’s lakes or hedge your bets at Salisbury Racecourse. There are some name-drop-worthy sites nearby too: storied Stonehenge is (sorry) a stone’s throw away, and the impressive Salisbury Cathedral is home to the Magna Carta. And if you’ve worked up a thirst too, Bluestone Vineyards quenches with sip-and-stroll tours.

Local restaurants

You’ll get generous helpings of willow-tree-framed river views and pub classics at waterfront Bridge Inn, where lingering lunches take place under the fairy-lit marquee or in the whitewashed dining room. At the history-steeped Haunch of Venison, comforting dishes are as traditional as the original wooden beams and antique furnishings. The warm embrace of Cosy Club nourishes with warmly lit interiors, all-day brunch and internationally inspired plates.

Local cafés

Neighbourly interactions at Sonder Coffee live up to its epiphany-striking name, and  the latte-art adorned brews, decadent sweet treats and buttery pasties provide extra food for thought. If the hotel’s inclination for all things avian has instilled a similar appreciation in you, call at Cuckoo Café for coo-worthy cuppas and best of British breakfasts.

Local bars

Mauls Wine & Cheese Bar is a love letter to the owners’ first date (which sounds like it went very well), and starry-eyed couples share flower-crowned cheeseboards paired with seasonally changing wines. Make a post-yomp pitstop at the Wheatsheaf in Lower Woodford for its local ales, bar bites and juicy burgers.

Reviews

Photos The Great Bustard reviews

Anonymous review

Every hotel featured is visited personally by members of our team, given the Smith seal of approval, and then anonymously reviewed. As soon as our reviewers have returned from this restaurant with rooms near Stonehenge and unpacked their jars of pickles and artisanal chutneys, a full account of their epicurean break will be with you. In the meantime, to whet your wanderlust, here's a quick peek inside the Great Bustard in Wiltshire…

The Great Bustard is a refined restaurant and pub with rooms in Wiltshire, and its namesake bird is found on the county’s flag. You might take cues from this avian mascot during your pastoral sojourn: great bustards are gregarious and hang out in flocks; you can gather in the plant-framed courtyard or at the convivial pub’s bar. 

They’re also omnivorous, a trait you’ll lean into at this food-focused boutique hotel, where healthy breakfasts, hearty Sunday roasts and wood-fired pizzas spotlight local farmers and the estate’s homegrown produce. You’ll find bottles of the owners’ Otarda (you guessed it, ‘great bustard’ in Italian) blend from their Tuscan estate, as well as other fine vintages in the wine cellar.

Along with farm-shop snacks, you’ll fill up on fresh-air pursuits: rural rambles, lake fishing and historical sites might rank high on your nature-based agendas. But cosy bedrooms are blessed with greenery-framed views and soft-hued interiors, so there’s little reason to fly the nest...

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Price per night from $125.86