Extended stays: several days rather than one evening

Two ways to build one

The first is simply repeated. Three overnights across a working week, each one its own booking at its own figure, with her own days in between. That suits a long stay where you have meetings in the morning and no appetite for a hotel bar in the evening, and it keeps every night separately agreed.

The second is a continuous stretch of two or three days, which Etta quotes as one figure once you have sketched the plan. That is the shape for a weekend, and it is the only thing on this desk that is not simply read off the ladder.

What fills the days out here

Rather more than the county is usually allowed. The river runs the whole length of it, and a boat at Boulters Lock above Maidenhead is a better afternoon than most people imagine. Windsor Great Park takes a long walk without ever feeling crowded, Cliveden has grounds that need a whole morning, and the Beeches above Burnham turn gold in October.

The hotels with grounds are the ones to pick for this. A house you can walk out of the back of changes a three day booking entirely, which is why Grovefield House and Fredrick's come up so often in these arrangements.

Sketch it, do not script it

Etta wants the outline and not a timetable. Which nights, roughly what you want to do with the days, where you are staying, and whether there is a fixed event in the middle of it like a dinner or a wedding. From that she comes back with two or three names who have the run of days free, and a single figure if it is a continuous booking.

Anything involving a passport needs a week at the very least, and the flights and rooms are booked by you in your own name. booking sets out everything else about how the arrangement is confirmed.

A long weekend, day by day

Friday begins in the evening. She arrives at your hotel around seven, dinner is somewhere close, and nobody tries to do too much on the first night. Saturday has the day in it, which out here means the river or the Great Park in the morning, lunch somewhere with a garden, a few hours apart in the afternoon and a proper dinner that nobody has to drive to. Sunday is slower still: a late breakfast, a walk, and a goodbye after lunch, when the trains back into London are easy.

Where to base three days

Pick one base and let the days go out from it. Windsor suits a stay with no car at all, since the town, the park and the river are all a walk. The houses around Burnham and Taplow suit a stay built on grounds and woodland, and Maidenhead sits between the two, with Boulters on one side and a fast train to London on the other. The airport hotels are right only for the final night, when a flight decides the morning.

If the dates move

Tell Etta as soon as the trip changes. A long stay is held night by night as well as in total, so losing one evening rarely unpicks the rest of it. If the project runs over and you want another week, ask early, because the same companion may not have a second run of days free.

Who takes several days

Margo is built for this. She works best across a long evening rather than a short one, and across three of them she is better still. Karolina will find something on most nights of the week and will have read about it beforehand. Violetta prefers a whole evening to an hour of one and walks home rather than being driven.

Vanessa is practised at the hours around departures and keeps a long stay calm, and Nancy wants the river and the table both, which is exactly the right instinct for three days out here. Diaries change, so start at who is on and let Etta tell you who has the whole run free.