Petersfield has an excellent selection of bars and restaurants, including our favourites Annie Jones in Lavant Street, Zen in Dragon Street and La Piazzetta in the Square. There is also the Michelin starred JSW in Dragon Street, a large Pizza Express and a variety of Indian and Chinese restaurants.

When staying overnight and looking for somewhere to have a drink or snack we can recommend three town centre bars: The George in the Square and The Folly Wine Bar on Dragon Street; or for a more traditional pub feel try the Good Intent on Dragon Street.

We are spoilt for country pubs. If you want a good lunch or evening meal, check out The Three Horseshoes (very busy on Summer weekends) at Elsted for an excellent menu, or the The Hawkley Inn for a more traditional village ‘local’ pub.

We recommend three excellent B&B’s for people attending our training courses. Heath Farmhouse (click here to visit website); Number 15 High Street (click here to visit website); and Border Cottage (click here to visit website) have been making our clients feel at home for a number of years and are all just a short walk from our centre.

Recent additions to the local Bed and Breakfast options also include Michelin star restaurant JSW (click here to visit website) – located yards from our centre; and if you don’t mind a 20-minute walk and would like to stay in a chain hotel, there is also a Premier Inn in Petersfield (click here to visit website).

There are plenty more locally so if you cannot get into any of these, please call us on 01730 233 414 for more recommendations.

Petersfield High Street has good slection of shops including Waitrose and Marks & Spencer food stores. In Lavant Street, the Bran Tub is our excellent local health food store and Rowans offers high quality deli food. For fashion and furnishings, Tricot Too and Hackman and Potter downstairs from the centre offer an eclectic and interesting mix. There is also Laura Ashley Home in the square, and Number Twenty, a top-end boutique in the High Street.

Features of the historic market town of Petersfield include The Flora Twort Gallery; The Heath; and England’s only slanted red telephone box. The South Downs offer excellent walking country and the countryside is breath-taking.

The historic naval centre of Portsmouth is only 20 minutes away. Petworth is just along the A272 with Petworth Park and House, and a huge selection of antique shops.

Trains run from Waterloo to Petersfield approximately every half hour duing the week, on the Portsmouth line and take just over one hour. Find out about times at National Rail enquiries www.nationalrail.co.uk or 08457 484950.

Southampton is the nearest airport (30 mins by taxi) but Gatwick and Heathrow are easily accessible. Train travel from Gatwick is via Guildford (journey time 60-90 minutes), whilst from Heathrow the coachlink to Woking station takes about 45mins, with a further 40 minutes for a train to Petersfield. Taxis to Heathrow or Gatwick cost about £50 in regular hours.

The A3 London to Portsmouth route provides good access to the motorway network. From Junction 10 of the M25 journey time is about 45 minutes. Bottlenecks can occur at Hindhead, usually Southbound in the evening and Northbound in the morning, and construction works for the tunnel opening in 2011 add a few minutes to journey times at present. The A272, the only road in Britain to have a colour picture book written about it, goes through Petersfield and provides access to Winchester and the M3, A34 Newbury and Oxford route to the Midlands and to West Sussex.