This imposing country house hotel is set in 100 acres of mature grounds in a peaceful location…
The Thatcher's

“A pretty, thatched, 16th-century free house by the village green”
HATFIELD HEATH, ESSEX
Our View
White-painted weatherboarding outside, inside some mighty stout timbers supporting the oak beams in the convivial bar, warmed by a wood-burning stove tucked into a cavernous inglenook. Eleven wines are offered by the glass, with real ales coming from, among others, Harvey's Sussex brewery. Dishes, all prepared in-house, range from white-meat crab remoulade, and lamb kofta with couscous, to slow-cooked ox cheek, and Suffolk chicken supreme. Toasties and sandwiches with fries add to the choices.
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Discover Essex
Essex is full of pleasant surprises. It has the largest coastline of any county in England, with its fair share of castles, royal connections and scenic valleys. Take Colchester, for example, which was built by the Romans and is Britain’s oldest recorded town. Its castle contains the country’s largest Norman keep and yet, a stone’s throw from here, East Anglia’s newest arts centre promises to put Colchester firmly on the map as Essex’s capital of culture.
Tidal estuaries are plentiful and their mudflats offer migrating birds a winter feeding place. Essex was known as the land of the East Saxons and for centuries people from all over Europe settled here, each wave leaving its own distinctive cultural and social mark on the landscape. Walking a little off the beaten track will lead you to the rural retreats of deepest Essex, while all over the county there are ancient monuments to explore:
- the great Waltham Abbey
- Greensted, thought to be the oldest wooden church in the world
- the delightful village of Pleshey has one of the finest examples of a former motte-and-bailey castle
- Hedingham Castle, magnificently preserved and dating from the 11th century.
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