ICE hockey and skating have made a nostalgic return to the lake of a castle which last year was transformed into a 20-bedroom country hotel.

Family and friends at Swinton Castle, former home of the Earl and Countess of Swinton, often played ice hockey and enjoyed skating parties on the one-acre lake at Masham.

But the tradition ended 25 years ago when the family sold the castle to the Lindley education trust, which ran the imposing building as a management training centre. The family last year bought back the castle, and the hotel is being run by Mr Mark Cunliffe-Lister and his wife Felicity.

Mr Cunliffe-Lister, a former member of Durham university ice hockey team, contacted former team mates and friends Mr Richard Bourne-Arton from West Tanfield and Mr Rupert Hone from London. And with others to make up two teams, they reintroduced skating and ice hockey to the lake during the recent cold snap.

Mr Cunliffe-Lister, grandson of the late Lord Whitelaw, the former Conservative deputy Prime Minister, said a combination of warmer winters and the family's absence from the castle had kept skating and ice hockey off the agenda. Lord Whitelaw was among former skaters at Swinton lake.

If regular icy spells do not return, Mr Cunliffe-Lister is hoping to use a heat exchange system, turning the lake into a huge fridge.

At the weekend two matches were held, one of them an England v France five-a-side staff encounter, the other involving friends and ex-members of the Durham team.

"England won the international 3-2 and it certainly wasn't a fix," said Mr Cunliffe-Lister.

and his wife, who married last year, left their jobs in London to return to the former family home and open the hotel. He worked as a geophysicist while his wife was a solicitor.

Fired by enthusiasm for skating and ice hockey in the grounds, he is rounding up a supply of skates which will also be kept handy for hotel guests.

He will always test the ice himself before allowing anyone on the frozen surface.

"The water is only waist deep and, while we have to improvise with the width, the length is just right for a full-sized pitch," he said.

Mr Cunliffe-Lister, who is heir to the family title Earl of Swinton, said the hotel's opening coincided with the foot-and-mouth disease crisis in North Yorkshire, which affected business.

But trade has shown a marked upturn recently with the hotel full over the festive period.