St Bartholomew's Church

The Church of St Bartholomew sits in quiet Staffordshire countryside, a few miles from Stoke-on-Trent, and it's genuinely worth stopping for if you're camping in the area. This is proper medieval England - the kind of place where you can actually feel the centuries settling around you rather than just reading about them on a plaque.

What you're looking at is a 12th-century structure that's been added to and fiddled with over the centuries, which is how most of these village churches work. The interior has some real character: timber framing, old stone work, and the sort of peace you only get in a quiet country church on a weekday afternoon. There's no grand tour here, no theatrical lighting - just a space that's been doing its job for 900 years.

It works best for walkers and history types rather than kids, unless yours are the sort who can amuse themselves looking at old brasses and imagining what life was like in the 1400s. The nearest campsites - Bank House Farm and Hartington Hills are both within three miles - make it an easy detour on a morning walk. Allow twenty minutes to have a proper look around, longer if you're the type who reads every inscription.

The whole appeal is that it's not done up as a visitor attraction. It's just a village church where you can slip in between your tent and a countryside walk. Free to enter (check locally before you visit), and genuinely atmospheric.