Cotley Inn (Somerset)

The Cotley Inn’s website says “tucked away down a peaceful country lane, the only noise you’ll hear is the sound of the clip-clopping of horses hooves or the animals in a nearby field.” That’s an interesting observation, as firstly The Inn sits on the Cotley Estate which is owned by the Eames family who also owns the privately-run Cotley Hunt, and secondly by ‘the sound of animals’ perhaps they mean dead pheasants falling to the ground with a thump as the Inn is by a nearby shoot that the Inn’s owners source meat from and where their Labrador is “put to good use“. The Inn was also the proud winner of the 2021 Countryside Alliance Award for ‘Best Pub’ – the owners saying they were proud to ‘wave the flag for rural tourism in Somerset’. As our site reveals, far too much of that ‘rural tourism’ is shooters travelling to kill birds…