Romantic cottages for two in the Peak District
Romantic cottages for two in the Peak District
Well, the die is cast, the decision has been made and Simon the video man will be here on Thursday and Friday next week, with his son Mike. We had been planning to wait until we had heard a definitely optimistic weather forecast but the longish range ones all seem a bit vague about the end of next week so we decided to take the risk and go for it. It will probably be grey and miserable, but it may well not and we could wait for ever – in fact today and yesterday would have been perfect days, but it’s too late to think that now!
Simon and Mike can only actually film the inside of the two ‘cottages’ on a Friday when they are both momentarily empty, and as the changeover has to continue regardless there isn’t a great deal of flexibility about the timing of the internal shots. On the Thursday they will do the outside and some quick snippets of the local area just to give a feel for our part of the Peak District and what is easily available to people staying here.
When we told our plans to one of our guests as they left this morning, she claimed to be horrified saying she loved the old video and it was the only reason they had decided to come here!! Well, it may have been the only reason some people didn’t, and I still squirm every time I hear my voice. It really is uncanny, when someone rings up to book and you can hear your own voice coming over the telephone wires, droning on and on in the background.
Anyway, the original video ‘expires’ in November so we have got to get a move on if we want another, and we do. Unfortunately, I have again drawn the short straw this time, and will be doing the ‘voice-over, so more squirms… But this time, if Simon chooses to film the removal from the Aga of the cake for the week at least I shall have made sure the Aga door is as near gleaming as we can get it!
What joy!
The B5056, our main route from Parwich to Ashbourne (it joins the A515 at Fenny Bentley a couple of miles north of Ashbourne) is now open again, after what seems like an age of us all having to straggle through Alsop on a road never meant for – and barely able to cope with – as much traffic as it has recently.
‘They’ really have done an amazing job, as far as the eye can see, and one can only hope and assume that the problems of landslip etc really have been overcome. It is wider, smoother and an absolute joy to drive along; I never imagined one would rave at the excitement of actually have two lanes instead of a single track, but, what joy!
Now the next excitement in the village (well, exciting for the vast majority of local people although there is a vocal minority who aren’t so pleased) will be the opening of the village hall. It is due to be finished very soon, slightly behind schedule after months of snow and ice hampered work over the winter, then lots of rain earlier in the spring. From the front (a bit like our barns) it doesn’t look anything special but from the back of the building, and even more strikingly, once inside, it is amazing – full of light and surprising angles, with the best possible use made of the relatively limited space.
The final excitement of the moment is a very little one but important to John and me. We have discovered, with Jeremy’s help, why we couldn’t load photos onto the website: something to do with Flash technology and nothing to do with any human incompetence to our relief and slight surprise.
For a couple of hours on Monday we almost felt like celebrities, with a photographer here from the Daily Telegraph snapping away at John and me and Tom’s and Douglas’s Barns from every angle. Sadly, we didn’t look quite look the celebrity picture but it was fun while it lasted and Gabriel the photographer was charming.
This followed an interview over the telephone by Claudine Beaumont, a journalist from the Daily Telegraph. I had been understandably surprised and apprehensive when the editor of the Weekend section emailed to ask if I would be agreeable, but Claudine made it all very easy and unfrightening – in fact she was so easy to talk to it was positively enjoyable.
After all this excitement, we heard nothing. Would an article appear at all? Would we and our barns be mentioned? We really didn’t know what to expect when the paper arrived this morning. Eventually we spotted something.
In today’s Weekend Section at the very end of an article by Claudine Beaumont on page 3 entitled ‘Cashing in on the Digital Age’ you might just spot, if you look hard, a column and a half about how John and I use web technology for running Tom’s and Douglas’s Barns (our self-catering holiday cottage accommodation and note, not guest house in case you were wondering!). Not a photograph to be seen, which is probably understandable and quite a relief but also in a way quite strange after all the photographic activity!
Anyway, do have a look; it makes me seem much wiser and more knowledgable than I am or feel! We will put up the link to the article when the Saturday paper goes online.
How frustrating!
Having spent most of Friday afternoon trying to get to grips with the brand new and frighteningly modern electric cooker we were all set to announce this latest excitement (and of course answer a dozen or so emails) when our server went down…
All is restored now, and there are now dozens of dozens of emails waiting so do forgive us if your reply is not yet forthcoming and we appear to be asleep – we aren’t!
In the last year or so we have made a lot of biggish purchases – the biggest in every sense of the word being the Vi-Spring bed/mattresses in both barns. The two burly delivery men really struggled up the spiral stair case with the custom made extra-wide extra-long Vi-Spring mattress for Douglas’s Barn, which they assured us, rather bitterly, weighed 18 stone.
Tom’s Barn has benefited the most, being the older of our two holiday cottages (it has been going now for nearly ten years). We have recently replaced a lot of equipment and furniture there including the bed, most notably the sofa, fridge, washing machine, flat screen bedroom telly… We have also just bought a brand new Pepe outside table and chairs for the Tom’s Barn garden although we have not yet had the weather to tempt anyone to relax for long outside.
Not yet arrived but ordered from John Lewis is a replacement all singing and all-dancing cooker. The old cooker (replaced in 2006) was still very good, but the Visit Britain inspector last year reckoned it let down the rest of the kitchen; therefore – in spite of all last year’s change and improvements – our score remained at resolutely at 90%, so we felt we didn’t have much option if we are to stand any chance of getting a Gold Award, as has Douglas’s Barn.
We have also introduced some new things in both barns, like the Sony Netbook, slow cookers and kitchen equipment (eco kettles, frying pans etc) and at the beginning of the year had both barns redecorated from top to toe.
The next two projects are to replace or recover the easy chair in Tom’s Barn (only four years old but somewhat faded and discoloured) and the boiler in Douglas’s Barn. After that we hope to sit back for a while, but somehow life tends not to work like that.
We may be nearly full this year, but 2011 is wide open with only a couple of bookings to date (four to be exact).
At the moment the silly problem is that until we have entered prices, no one can book online. The obvious answer is to decide on prices but how does one anticipate what will be the cost of oil, electricity, insurance, business tax, not to mention all the bits and bobs we always put in to the barns to make our guests’ lives easier…?
So we have come to the conclusion we will try to make an intelligent estimate, aiming higher rather than too low – one can always reduce a price but it is not good practice to increase a price once it has been advertised.
During 2010 any price increase for 2011 is all irrelevant anyway, because anyone booking this year uses this year’s prices
When you book online we will automatically discount the advertised price when we process the payment.
At least it will mean if you want to plan ahead you now can book next year to your heart’s content. However, it will be more important than ever that you seriously consider taking out holiday cancellation insurance.
Rest assured that if your plans change and you need to change your dates some time beforehand we can usually arrange that, with time in hand. It will just incur a nominal £10 ‘botheration’ admin charge. If we have to advertise the dates at a discounted rate, we will pass on what we receive, less the £10.
It is the last minute cancellations or need to change dates that happen too late for us to re-sell the dates that would leave you still having to pay for the holiday although unable to take it. From our point of view, we would almost certainly have let the dates given enough time. It is only fair that it is you and not we who bear the responsibility for the cost of the cancelled holiday. Holiday cancellation insurance does seem the answer!
Well, nobody booked this midweek break Monday 15th (Ides of March) to Friday 18th March so we have with some excitement and unseemly haste, moved in ourselves to enjoy the delights – or otherwise – at first hand.
What a difference, just crossing that courtyard, seemed to make, silly as it might sound… we really do feel we are on holiday which is unfortunate, as we aren’t really, but we are going to make the most of it. Tomorrow night we are hoping to try to make a steak and kidney pudding in the slow cooker, so first stop the White Peak Butchery in Tissington.
We’ve asked our good friend American Debs (who many of you may have had contact with, as she look after the admin side of things when we go away) and her husband Trevor to supper so let’s hope the S&KP turns out OK.
Plus points so far – Lovely welcome (from Janet, each other and our co-guests in Douglas’s Barn), nice atmosphere, fire lit, beautifully warm, Moonlight Sonata on Classic FM…
BUT no cake (we slipped up there, but plenty of lemon drizzle next door and John did remember a nice bottle of wine); more seriously, we couldn’t get a squeak out of the telephone. How embarrassing – how long has that not worked? Why did nobody tell us – it is hard to believe it just stopped working tonight. John tried new batteries to no avail – so tomorrow we’ll buy a new one.
How many more glitches will we discover? Off to check the bath out now, further reports tomorrow. We’ll try to get Debbie to report her findings too.
We’ve succumbed. We daily turn away so many hopeful people who want unavailable dates, we couldn’t believe we’d find ourselves with a midweek break absolutely nobody at all seems to want…!
Maybe it’s been a battle of nerves, with someone out there waiting to see if we’d drop the price. Well, we have! We have reduced it by £40 to £305. If it doesn’t go, John and I are proposing to do a bit of hands on quality control (does that entitle us to write a review on TripAdvisor? Most certainly not, I’d say).
We have tried out both barns, but several years ago now. We have made many changes since then – all to the good, we fondly hope, but as one of our guests very rightly pointed out, you can only guess – you cannot know – how convenient or how comfortable something is until you have actually experienced it personally.
However, don’t let our good intentions put anyone off booking next week. If the dates go (and the weather had been quite beautiful for the past week) we will make a point of booking in for a short break in both of our very popular cottages for two in the winter once we have some more gaps.
It was cheerful but exhausting. At least we weren’t actually doing the decorating but there was a lot of moving stuff out, moving stuff back, cleaning, sorting, replacing…
Janet and Carol did a fantastic job, coming in quite voluntarily two (extra) evenings to make sure they got everything done in time for our next guests due last Friday. And of course by the time our guests arrived everything looked quite ordered and serene.
We also had the pressure on, this end, making sure we had all the paperwork ready for our ‘green’ inspection for the Green Tourism in Business Scheme, which was scheduled for that very same Friday. The preparation was arduous, but the actual inspection when the time came very pleasant; it will be several weeks before we know the outcome but we are hoping we will move up a notch to the Silver Award section. We will announce the verdict as soon as we hear ourselves!
Well, we’re back to normal after a particularly busy week. Jason and Stuart (who are amazing decorators) managed to redecorate both barns within a week working throughout the weekend before last. They spend as much time on what many of us find the unbearably boring sanding and rubbing down, but it pays off. The paintwork looks immaculate.
We thought the barns looked pretty good beforehand but they do look particularly fresh and inviting now. In Douglas’s Barn we repeated the Farrow & Ball Buff for the woodwork and Matchstick for the walls because that seemed to have been a happy choice.
But, what for Tom’s Barn? After much deliberation and soul searching we plumped for Slipper Satin throughout (a rather attractive white, if that makes sense) and for the woodwork Old White which depending in the light is off-white, or pale grey – even sometimes pale grey with an almost olive tinge…
We think it looks great, let’s hope you do too.
I have had the pleasure of managing Tom and Douglas Barns for 10 Years and felt it was time to enjoy a bit more of my retirement. The barns will continue to be holiday cottages and will be maintained to the standard that all previous guests have enjoyed. The only change is that Sykes Cottages […]
The weather is a bit mixed but we are still getting sunny days. A perfect time of year to come and stay for a few days and have a walk in the lovely countryside, take a bike ride, visit one of the many attractions that all stay open or just relax in Tom or Douglas […]
The weather has been so wet but our barns offer a cosy retreat in beautiful countryside. Why not pack a bag for a few days and have a break . We have extended our spring prices until mid June and reduced our summer prices. It would be lovely to see you for a few days […]
