A historic Devon hotel renowned for fishing is for sale at £2.5m. The Arundell Arms in Lifton, an 18th-century coaching inn listed among the best in the UK for fishing by the Good Hotel Guide, has been put on the market by property broker Christie & Co. The current owners, Simon Village and Arabella Monro, purchased the hotel in August 2020 for an undisclosed sum and are now selling up after achieving what they set out to do, according to the broker.
Stephen Champion, director of hotels at Christie & Co, who is managing the sale, said: “We are delighted to bring The Arundell to the market, representing a rare opportunity to acquire a high-quality, well-established hotel with a super reputation. We anticipate significant interest from a diverse range of buyers, given the strength of trading and further growth potential on offer.”
Fishing and sporting reputation
The hotel’s sporting credentials are at the heart of its appeal. It holds access to 22 miles of private fishing rights on the rivers Tamar, Lyd, Thrushell and Lew, and owns 324 fully paid-up shares in the Endsleigh Fishing Club, which gives it two rods on that club’s waters. The on-site fly fishing school, established in 1932, is regarded as one of the best in the country. The Arundell Arms was named Sporting Hotel of the Year by the Good Hotel Guide in 2006 and was voted Top Sporting Hotel by GunsOnPegs & Shooting Gazette in 2010.
Beyond fishing, the hotel is also known for shooting. It works with estates across Devon and Cornwall, offering classic driven game shoots for teams of up to nine guns, with a focus on pheasant, partridge, woodcock and snipe. Knut Wylde, the owner’s representative, said: “The Arundell occupies a position in the market that very few properties in this country can genuinely claim, a sporting hotel of national significance, a food and beverage offer that has earned its reputation on merit, and a character that cannot be franchised.”
The property’s sporting facilities extend to an event space and bar built on the site of a historic cockfighting pit, one of the few surviving examples in England. The pit itself is more than 200 years old, and a pair of cockfighting spurs are among the hotel’s relics; the space now serves as a rod room and is used for fishing briefings.
History and facilities
The Arundell Arms is a 300-year-old former coaching inn that was originally known as The White Horse. Its history reaches back to Saxon times, with King Alfred recorded as Lord of the Manor of Lifton. The hotel sits one mile off the A30 near the Devon-Cornwall border and close to Dartmoor. It was owned by the same family for 60 years before being sold in August 2020 by Adam Fox-Edwards and his sister Jane to Simon Village and Arabella Monro, who took over “at the height of the Covid pandemic”, described as a challenging time. The current owners have invested close to £1 million in restoration and refurbishment, including a full rewire, new plumbing, refurbished bathrooms, restored sash windows, a new restaurant floor, and redecoration of all bedrooms and public spaces.
The hotel has 21 bedrooms, a two-bedroom self-catering fishing cottage, and a separate, self-contained four-bedroom staff flat with its own kitchen. Dining options include a gastro pub and a two-AA-rosette restaurant that emphasises local and seasonal produce, as well as an on-site cafe and deli. There is a book-lined guest lounge with a log-burning fire, four function spaces that can accommodate parties of up to 100 guests, and 16 Tesla charging points for electric vehicles. Wylde described the opportunity for a buyer as “literally once in a generation”.
