The Fleece Inn, Bretforton

The Fleece began as a fifteenth-century longhouse where family and livestock shared a roof, and it has scarcely stopped gathering stories since. Its flagstones still carry the 'witch circles' chalked to keep spirits from coming down the chimney; a celebrated seventeenth-century pewter collection gleams in one of its three small rooms; and asparagus from the Vale of Evesham is auctioned here with due ceremony each spring. Left to the National Trust in 1977 by Lola Taplin, whose family had held it for centuries, it is run today as a proper living village pub, with local ales, cider and morris dancers and folk sessions spilling into the medieval barn.

Six hundred years of continuous village life under one thatchless medieval roof, preserved by the Trust but run as a genuine independent local — impossible to replicate.

• History Lovers
• Food Lovers
• Family Adventure