About Us

Isabel and Ken Adams run the Waterdine with the help of Caroline in the restaurant on busy times, Annie who looks after the bedrooms and of course Isabel’s mother Pam, who since moving into Bumbles Lodge has taken over some of the gardening the dog feeding and generally keeps us all in order.

We have between us three dogs, two retrievers Norrie and Amber and then there is Bramble the cocker spaniel who is boss dog, unless either of the other two put their foot down, in which case she makes herself scares until she feels it safe to resume her natural station in life.

Ken who is a classically trained chef runs the kitchen and produces all the food, Isabel who trained in front of house duties at the Elms Hotel Abberly looks after everything else.

In 1994 we opened the Oaks restaurant on Ludlow, our first restaurant, after successfully trading at the oaks for six years we sold the restaurant to Claude Bosi and moved to the Waterdine in May 2000.    

The Waterdine building is a simple 16th century Drovers inn with original timber floors and many original leaded windows, the public rooms are quite small comprising of;- a lounge with an original stone floor, inglenook fireplace with a wood burner, exposed beams and expose original wattle in the wall of the bar, There are two steps down into the lounge and one step up into the bar with its ancient elm floor, toilets are in their own separate block adjoining the lounge.

A further lounge area south facing with seating for 8 people leading to the garden room also south facing with beautiful views over the upper Teme valley, the sun room forms part of the restaurant, here we have seating for 8- 10 people, a doorway leads into the old Tap Room with further seating for twelve people the Tap room has an inglenook fireplace with a massive oak mantle which shows the scars of the candles used in the past to light the room, the fireplace is now fitted with a wood burning stove, the Tap room  also has original beams and an unusual  16th century brick flooring. The whole building is set in mature gardens, which during the summer make a wonderful place to sit with your pre-dinner drinks whilst you choose you dinner from our menu.

The garden is a haven for many of Britain’s songbirds, too many to mention individually, we are also blessed with many birds of prey, from the hovering Red Kites the soaring Buzzards to the swooping hawks. Times spent sitting in the gardens are never without interest, and on occasion compleate drama. Such was the case recently when suddenly a hawk swooped on a sparrow; it took the bird, but fortunately, for the sparrow, it was moving too fast and collided with one of the larger shrubs. In the ensuing pandemonium with the dogs rushing over to see what all the commotion was about the sparrow managed to make good its escape and the hawk somewhat ruffled shot out of the shrub and made its undignified exit from the scene.