WITH the hunting season winding down comes thoughts of travelling to distant counties where, even if hunting isn’t any better than at home, it is certainly different. The thrill of a completely new pack with total strangers who before day’s end will be valued hunting companions. Of course part of the joy is the pre and post hunt hospitality.

However, the new drink driving regime has put something of a kybosh on all that. So let’s suppose that you would like all of the above with none of the hassle and have a few quid put aside perhaps for a weekend in New York where you will be bored stiff after the first day, after all you can only stay looking up at skyscrapers for so long.

My idea of a really proper hunting trip away would be leave home with no more than my hunting kit and my favourite companion, go to a nice hotel with all the trimmings.

After a leisurely breakfast with perhaps a refreshing glass of port to settle the constitution, arrive at the meet where your horses are there to greet you. These could either be your own trusted steeds (in which you have undying confidence) or perhaps a pair of hand chosen hirelings.

After some convivial hospitality you sit up have a cracking day only to arrive back at the proper hunting pub where your driver is ready to whisk you back to your hotel for a jacuzzi , perhaps a short stay in the sauna before settling down to a five-star meal.

Surely you must say this the stuff of fantasy and if not how could it be done?

Well the good news that it is not the stuff of fantasy and with the aid of a good hunting hotelier such as Louis Murphy of Dunraven Arms all of the above is possible. Whether you would like to have your own trusted steeds or handpicked hirelings, Louis can arrange it all.

If it is your own horses he would arrange livery the night before book you in for what you would hope would be a good day with one of the local packs, arrange for your horses to be delivered and collected after the day with a car and driver waiting to bring you there and back.

Would it be expensive? Of course it would, but perhaps comparable to a weekend in somewhere like New York or a skiing weekend. For a hunting person it would be incomparably more enjoyable.

Could you be guaranteed a cracking day’s hunting, well not even Louis Murphy could guarantee that. However, you would have a weekend that you would fondly remember when other trips away would have morphed into one another.

Other hotels to be considered:

All of the above are run by hunting patrons who could take care of weary foxhunters