Hotel Hermitage

Golf Club Hermitage sits behind the hotel, on the hillside facing the Gulf of Biodola, the Scaglieri and the island of Capraia. There are nine holes: eight par 3s and one par 4, spread over 1,275 metres of slopes, mounds and paths. It is short, but a proper course: the holes are CONI-approved, the club belongs to the Italian Golf Federation and in summer it runs handicap-counting competitions.

The most original touch is the practice range, built around an artificial lake and played with floating balls, so you can rehearse the shot over water without losing your supply. The club also caters for beginners, with lessons from a pro, and rents out bags and golf carts. Guests of the Hermitage and of the family's two other hotels, the Biodola and the Del Golfo, get dedicated offers and promotions. The course is open from April to October.

The course, the tennis courts, the restaurants and the twelve small villas that hold most of the rooms are scattered through the Mediterranean scrub at the far end of Biodola beach, 7 km from Portoferraio. Rooms range from 20 m² garden-view doubles to the 60 m² Suite Paolina, with family rooms for four.

The private beach is for hotel guests only, open from 8am to 7pm, with two loungers, an umbrella and a beach towel per person included. If you prefer rocks, you can slip into the sea from terraces cut into the shoreline. The three pools all use seawater: the central pool, the 'Caribbean' pool with its swim-up bar, and a warm hydromassage pool. Children have a daily Miniclub; dogs are welcome for a supplement, but not in the restaurant, lounges or pools.

Executive chef Paolo Balestrazzi cooks with island produce: San Martino tomatoes, anchovies, lobster, line-caught fish, and herbs picked on the Biodola itself. Dinner is at Ristorante Hermitage, for Italian cooking, or at La Ghiotta, the gourmet room with a sea view. By the pool, Fuoco di Bosco serves light Mediterranean dishes, pizza and grills, and children have a restaurant of their own, Peter Pan. Gluten-free products are available in every restaurant.

The spa pairs massages and face and body treatments with a circuit of sauna, Turkish bath, thalassotherapy and an aromatherapy whirlpool. Its tailor-made programmes combine treatments with golf, tennis or swimming and a light menu from Fuoco di Bosco.

Beyond golf, the Hermitage has nine tennis courts, eight of them clay and one artificial grass, with an FIT-qualified coach, plus a padel court. On the beach an SSI dive centre teaches courses from age 8, and there are windsurfers, canoes, RIBs and water-ski gear for hire. Guests arriving by boat can use a private jetty and a mooring field in the neighbouring Baia dell'Elefante.

• A beach shared with Errol Flynn: in 1955 Paolo and Ileana De Ferrari, from a noble Genoese family, discovered the Biodola. Among the handful of people on the sand, the hotel says, was Errol Flynn.
• Half a century in the family: the De Ferraris have run the Hermitage for more than fifty years, later adding the Biodola and Del Golfo hotels.
• A bunker in the grounds: the hotel's 'Percorso della Salute', a walking and running trail through the park, passes through a wartime military bunker.