The Moat House

The Moat House sits in lakeside grounds at Acton Trussell, a listed manor house with fifteenth-century bones that has grown into a comfortable four-star country hotel a couple of minutes off the M6 between Stafford and Cannock. Dogs are welcome, and the grounds are the reason it works: water, lawns and the canal towpath are all reachable on a lead before breakfast, so the first walk of the day never needs the car.

Dogs stay in designated dog-friendly rooms, and those are limited enough that booking by phone rather than online is the sensible route. The fee is around £20 per pet, per night, worth confirming when you call along with the room itself. Dogs need to be on a lead in the public areas and should not be left alone in the room, and the usual damage or extra-cleaning charges apply. Service animals are explicitly welcomed.

Owners who have stayed here with a dog describe a team willing to make it work, including for guests who arrived without a designated pet room booked. That flexibility is the strongest signal the property gives, and it lines up with the wider picture from guests, who rate the staff and the restaurant highly. Being able to eat well on site matters with a dog in tow, because it shortens the stretch the dog spends alone upstairs.

Two things are worth planning around. The hotel is a busy wedding venue, and Friday and Saturday nights can be noticeably louder as a result, which suits a settled dog better than a nervous one. The bar also gets crowded when the restaurant is full. Midweek stays sidestep both.

It suits owners of one calm, well-socialised dog who want a smart lakeside base near Stafford with good food on site and easy motorway access, and who are happy to phone ahead to secure the right room. On that basis it earns a 4.5 out of 5 paw rating.