Higher Beeson House

The 16th-century farmhouse and stables, arranged around a neat yard, have been kitted out with ground-source underfloor heating and natural slate floors. Bedrooms are in the stables: all are a good size, newly carpeted, spotless with good lighting. Find the chic summerhouse by the lake, replete with wood-burning stove and comfy chairs. Lynda and Charles give you a great local breakfast in the beamed dining room with views through the kitchen to their much loved garden. Originally four acres of boggy wilderness it now thrives. There’s a pond stocked with rudd, visited by mallards and moorhens, and packed with flag irises and lilies. Then a series of steps and terraces (all built by clever Charles), bubbling fountains, timber decks, a waterfall, and a greenhouse. Lynda is the plantswoman and she goes for big plants! Gunnera, bamboo, echiums and a banana plant all zoom heavenward while yuccas, phormiums and agapanthus add to the exotic feel. In a perennial bed there are more traditional plants like roses and stocks. So peaceful, so much wildlife; pick a bench and delight in it all. Sometimes you can hear the sea.