STEPHEN McCLARENCE meets TV's Eric Knowles during an Antiques Roadshow-style short break in Nottinghamshire

IT IS teatime in Nottinghamshire and Derek Kenyon and Hilary Johnson are delving into their carrier bags. Out come a pair of brass candlesticks, a decorative porcelain slipper and a Royal Copenhagen vase. "Nobody else must see these, " whispers Derek.

"It's got to be a surprise tonight."

Click here now for amazing offers to Nottinghamshire!

"Tonight" is the climax of an Antiques Experience at Thoresby Hall Hotel & Spa on the edge of Sherwood Forest.

The big draw for Derek and Hilary and the other enthusiasts on the break is Eric Knowles from BBC TV's Antiques Roadshow. He will be valuing treasures they've brought from home or picked up on a trip to Europe's biggest international antique and collectors' fair at nearby Newark.

Will they be heirlooms or errors, pots of gold or just pots?

As Thoresby's dance afternoon draws to a close in the lounge and the Tea Time Teaser quiz gears up in the bar, the group waits impatiently for valuation time. The grandest antique of all here is Thoresby Hall itself. This stateliest of stately Victorian homes, with its turrets and terraces, was designed to impress with excess.

The property went into decline in the Eighties but was rescued by Warner Leisure Hotels which added a smart accommodation wing to create a 220-bedroom hotel designed, as its brochure proclaims, "exclusively for adults". This is a nice way of saying "no children" or perhaps, given the impressive maturity of many of the guests, no grandchildren.

Want incredible deals to Nottinghamshire? Click here now...

It's a restful place, serving afternoon tea in the baronial Great Hall which boasts sculpted stags and a fireplace as big as a bus shelter.

Even so, the days are packed with activities (line dancing, indoor skittles, archery lessons) and the evenings pulsate with entertainment (almost everyone joining in with the Al Jolson song). It's like taking a cruise on dry land. The three restaurants are excellent, the bedrooms are comfortable and the staff extremely helpful.

As for Eric Knowles, what a refreshing man he is in the plummy world of antiques. A likely lad from Lancashire, he claims his knowledge of French is based on 'Allo 'Allo!

The group hangs on his every word. I seem, in fact, to have stumbled on the Midlands branch of the Eric Knowles Appreciation Society. Charles and Evelyn Pitman have done three such breaks. "Eric is such a charming man and so enthusiastic, " says Evelyn.

Knowles is in no doubt about the lure of antiques. "The monetary element is the hook, like it or not, " he tells me. "I'm a valuer first and foremost, but a valuer with a romantic twist. I'd like people to look at something for what it is rather than what it's worth."

Before his next talk, we all drive to Newark's antiques fair, with its astonishing 4,000 stalls. Over three foot-slogging hours, I discover that antiques take many forms: a bust of John Wesley, an MG 1100 driver's handbook, a stuffed starfish, a collection of old beermats and a programme for the West Ham versus Stoke City match on January 7, 1961.

The antiques group members are full of their buys as they gather for the valuation session. Knowles, framed by curtains and dramatically lit, brings a touch of stand-up to his valuations.

He talks nearly non-stop for two-and-a-half hours and Derek and Hilary can't take their eyes off him.

Just before the end, he picks up Hilary's porcelain slipper. She tenses.

"Meissen, 1925-ish, " he says. She paid £50 for it. He values it at £120.

She got the day's best bargain. "It's fabulous, I can't believe it, " she says.

For the record, I've bought nothing at the fair except a cheese toastie.

I show it to Knowles. Its age, I wonder?

"About 20 minutes, " he suggests. Its value? "£2." He is clearly no expert on toasties. It cost me £3.40.

THE KNOWLEDGE:
Warner Leisure Hotels (0800 138 8399/www.warnerleisurehotels.co.uk) offers a three-night weekend break at Thoresby Hall Hotel & Spa from £263pp (two sharing), half board.

Eric Knowles hosts an Antiques Experience at the group's Alvaston Hall, Cheshire. The four-night break at Alvaston Hall (October 25 -29) from £251pp (two sharing), half board. Antiques supplement £85.

Experience Nottinghamshire: 0844 477 5678/www.visitnottingham.com

Visit Chester: 0845 647 7868/ www.visitchester.com