Parkhotel Marlena

The home course is Golf Club Lana, below the walls of the ruined Brandis castle: 9 holes laid out by British architect Michael Pinner in 1998, with three par 3s, four par 4s and two par 5s. The hotel describes itself as the club's founder and operator, and gives its guests special rates there, plus a free South Tyrol Golf Card for the province's other courses. There is a lockable caddy room at the hotel, and reception books tee times.

Lana's teaching is led by head pro Kuno Profanter, at the academy since 2002, with teaching pro Massimo Danilo Prantil. The "Home advantage" package includes one 9-hole and one 18-hole green fee and 10% off the golf school: 3 nights from €616 per person. Complete beginners can book "Achieve handicap in 5 days": four days and 10 hours of one-to-one coaching, with green fees, range balls and club hire included, ending with the Italian Golf Federation handicap exam.

Marlena is two buildings in a park: the main house and a modern Villa, with daylight in every room, a view from every suite and a roof terrace. Owner Hans Inderst says art is his great passion, and it shows: inside hang works by Luis Stefan Stecher, Marcello Jori and Rudolf Stolz, while the park holds sculptures in metal, wood and marble and a zen garden of cypresses and olive trees.

Marlengo station, on the Vinschgau line, is about 300 metres away, and the hotel puts Bolzano airport about half an hour off. Dogs are welcome at €20 a day.

The spa covers 1,000 m². The panoramic outdoor pool in the park looks over Merano and is in use from April to October; the indoor pool has a three-dimensional wall by Luis Stefan Stecher. There are seven kinds of sauna, including two panoramic lounge saunas behind the outdoor pool, a salt-water tub and treatments with Maria Galland products. In the evening, from 8:30 to 10:30 pm, two people can book the spa to themselves, with sparkling wine and fruit, for €90.

The east-facing, glass-walled restaurant looks out over Merano and the Adige valley, and in summer dinner moves onto the terrace. Chef Ernst Riedl cooks the five-course dinner of the gourmet half board. On autumn evenings there is the Stube decorated by Stecher, and the enoteca hosts wine and olive-oil tastings with the sommelier.

• A birthday present on the wall: Hans Nowak's Dutch landscape in the stone-pine Stube was a gift from the family of Dr Klaus Vogel for Marlena's fifth birthday, in 1983.
• Family-designed saunas: the two panoramic saunas are the work of architect Marlen Inderst.
• A room called the "bunker": its walls and ceiling are lined with a single curved skin of wood, hung with a photograph by Johannes Inderst, the owner's son.
• A canal path next door: 12 minutes' walk away runs the Marlinger Waalweg, about 12 km along an old irrigation channel, the longest in South Tyrol according to the hotel.
• A one-euro dog wash: near the hotel, a self-service station for washing and grooming dogs is open around the clock.