Bear Of Rodborough Hotel
Stroud, Gloucestershire

High above the Cotswold town of Stroud, sat amidst an expanse of National Trust land, lies the Bear of Rodborough Hotel. Built some 300 years ago, this former coaching inn has been attentively restored to embrace its heritage and period features; the interior has been lavished with rich fabrics and antique furniture. From its position on Rodborough Common The Bear commands spectacular views over the region's surrounding hills and valleys.

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Stroud is a town and civil parish in the county of Gloucestershire, England. It is the main town in Stroud District. Historically, Stroud is known for its involvement in the Industrial Revolution. It was a cloth town; woollen mills were powered by the small rivers which surge through the five valleys, and supplied by Cotswold sheep grazed on the hills above. Particularly noteworthy was the production of military uniforms in the trademark Stroudwater Red colour. Stroud was a fairly major industrial and trading location in the nineteenth century, and so needed transport links. It first had a canal network built: the Stroudwater Navigation and the Thames & Severn Canal, both of which struggled to survive until the early 20th century. The canals are now being restored as a leisure facility by a partnership of British Waterways and the Cotswold Canals Trust (formerly the Stroudwater, Thames and Severn Canal Trust) with a multi-million pound Lottery grant. Stroud railway station (on the Gloucester-Swindon "Golden Valley" line) was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel.