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Review 248: Rural Retreats, Plough Cottage (Well Farm)

www.ruralretreats.co.uk

Recommended. Review by Pauline from NM

1bed/1bath cottage on farm near Painswick, in the Cotswolds, Heart of England

When

May 2000, 4 weeks

Review

We stayed in this cottage for four weeks on our trip in May 2000. It is a very nice cottage in an excellent location. I highly recommend the cottages on Well Farm. The farm is no longer a working farm, although there are some sheep and goats in one of the fields. They have three rental cottages. The owners, Richard and Lydia Savage, live in a beautiful and very old main house (from the 16th century). The cottages were farm outbuildings converted about 10 years ago and even more recently updated.

Plough Cottage is the best one of the cottages, I think. In this picture, it is the one on the right. It has one bedroom, one bathroom. Downstairs is a modern kitchen (stove, oven, microwave, dishwasher, washer/dryer), dining area with a desk, living room with stereo, TV, VCR, and the bathroom with a jacuzzi tub and shower in tub. Upstairs is a small bedroom. The cottage is built into a hill so that both the lower and upper levels are at ground level. Downstairs is very bright with a big window looking west into the Painswick valley. You look out onto fields, woods, and villages. Downstairs there are two doors to the outside each with sitting areas. There is a door to the outside upstairs as well with a nice sitting area. Richard and Lydia Savage, who own and run Well Farm, are great to deal with and have done a wonderful job with the cottages. The gardens are incredible. Any area where you decide to sit outside is full of flowers in pots and planters. We were always surrounded by tulips in May. Two cats live on the farm: Filbert and Nutmeg. If you leave your door open, they walk right in. Filbert is the more brazen one. Lydia is originally from the US, so she understands we Americans.

Plough Cottage is really a fabulous cottage. The only downside is that the bed is small - a double size, not a queen - and the bathroom is on a different level from the bedroom (for those of us who have to get up in the night).

The location is also perfect. You are 1 km from Painswick, a perfect and uncrowded Cotswold village with an excellent tearoom, a good pub and restaurant, and two small grocery stores. You are 2 km from Stroud, a good sized town with two superstores (Tesco and Waitrose), a natural foods store, a vegetarian cafe (lunch only), and many other stores and restaurants.

When we stayed here, we hiked all over the Cotswolds and decided that the hiking right in this valley was the best. The Cotswold hiking books list several hikes that you can do within a few miles from here. You can also do some nice hikes right from the cottage.

See the UK & Ireland - Travel Notes section for hiking information.

This review is the opinion of a Slow Travel member and not of slowtrav.com.

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Review 248: Rural Retreats, Plough Cottage (Well Farm)

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