It feels like home

We've just returned from our summer holiday. We booked a week in a cottage in the Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire. We'd originally planned on going to The New Forest as we fancied something a bit different from our usual coastal based holidays, but the New Forest is a popular destination and it seems I'd left it a bit late to find anything that fitted out family or our budget. However, I came across The Forest of Dean website and in turn found this amazing house that had even more beds that we needed and was reasonably priced. It's a private rental so I emailed the owner to ask if it was available for our week. To my delight it was.

The house has four bedrooms each with it's own bathroom, the usual kitchen, dining & living rooms plus a garden room and a basement room. So in other words, space, something we are a bit short on at home.

We loaded up the car with our belongings, four children and the dog.

Are we nearly there yet?

We arrived at the house and lets just say it didn't disappoint. I wanted to cry, it was just so perfect and the pictures on the owners site really hadn't done it justice.

The surroundings were simply beautiful. So peaceful and pretty.

 We were all very keen to get into the house. The children ran off to choose bedrooms, which I'm pleased to say worked out really well. Our bedroom was picked for us, as it was the only one with a double bed. It was on the ground floor and had an ensuite shower room. The remaining three bedrooms were on the first floor. They were all large, light and airy rooms. The first room had a wonderful bathroom with a double sized shower enclosure and a roll top bath. Somehow our two youngest managed to bag this room. If it were my house that room would be the master bedroom. I really do feel that the bathroom was wasted in the pair of them, but I wasn't prepared to spend a week in twin beds just to have the best bathroom in the house!
If I'm honest going by the website pictures I was worried that the third of the upstairs rooms wasn't going to be as nice as the others, but I was wrong. It was a lovely light room with a very generously sized ensuite. Looking back at the website pictures I can see that they must have been taken in the winter when the light is cold. The rooms are all larger than they look in the pictures and so much brighter too.

We'd ordered our weekly food shopping online and had it delivered about an hour after we arrived. The owners had very kindly left us a welcome tray, which got dismantled before I'd even thought about locating my camera! They'd left tea, coffee, biscuits, a bottle of locally produced wine, a welcome card and milk in the fridge. They've paid so much attention to detail in the house, little things like loo roll and hand wash in every bathroom, cleaning products and kitchen essentials all to hand. I've often arrived at self catering accommodation only to discover not a single sheet of toilet paper in the house! So now I always take supplies with me (tea towels, washing up liquid, toilet paper, soap, and a few herbs & spices) But I really needn't have bothered. The place was spotless and everything you needed was in place so that all you needed to do was unpack and relax.
I really could just write a whole blog entry about how much I loved this house. I can honestly say I've never felt as at home anywhere before, not even my own home! It was just perfect for us.

We went out every day. The weather was actually very good, despite the forecasts! It did rain a couple of days but it was either before we went out or after we got back so it's didn't matter at all. Most of the places we visited were easily less than half an hour in the car. Some were as close as ten minutes and I'm very pleased to report that none of them were very expensive. I think the most we spent on entry to an attraction was £33, which for six of us isn't too bad at all.
We went to The Sculpture Trail which is a trail through the forest that stops off at seventeen different pieces of art. Some were huge and others hidden away in the forest floor. We had a map that we found at the house that told you who each of the artists were and what they were trying to convey. It took almost 3 hours to walk round and cost us just the price of parking, £3.50 for a whole day.

Perrygrove Railway was next.

'Lydia'

 A miniature steam railway set in woodlands with a treasure trail for the children to follow and a treetop play area.It was a really nice day as the could happily go off and explore with out the fear of getting lost!! After Perrygrove we went to the aMazing Hedge Puzzle. We manged to lose one of the children but only temporarily thanks to the viewing platform!

Dick Whittington Farm Park kept everyone happy with animals to feed, lots of indoor slides and Go-Karts.
We also visited Puzzlewood (another woodland attraction where they've filmed parts of Harry Potter and the TV series Merlin), Clearwell Caves with it's lovely Tea Room and Caldicot Castle which is just across the border in Wales.

Clearwell Caves 

Caldicot castle

Another treasure hunt

All of the above were great. But some of the best times were the ones that cost us nothing at all. Like the fun we had most evenings after I discovered a Table Tennis set in the garage.

Or going for long walks in the woodland that surrounded the house

Or just spending time at the house, playing games, reading, watching a film with the woodburner glowing, making the whole house toasty and warm.

 Bruno enjoyed the holiday too. Even though he couldn't come out with us every day he was very happy. The garden was totally 'Bruno proof' (he's a bit of an escape artist, we call him Houdini!) so he was free to roam, the walks we went on left him blissfully tired but usually muddy!

Fetch!

 He soon gave up barking at free roaming sheep that wandered past the house every night, they really weren't bothered by him at all.

The holiday was generally a really good time. We had no Wii, no WiFi and no mobile phones. What we did have was lots of great quality time as a family. Sometimes we were all together and other times we were spread out all doing our own thing, whatever that might have been. Even though there was a lovely pub very close to the house, we only ate out once, on our last evening, as we were all happy enough to be at the house. The only thing I feel we missed out on was sampling the lovely local cider earlier in the week. But I'm pleased to say that it can (and will) be ordered online.


Not only did we have a good holiday but me and Mr P came away with ideas, hopes and dreams for our future. I really hope we go back to Hazeldene again. It's a very special house that feels like home X