Celebrating English tourism week and eight years at Halsbeer farm

This year English Tourism Week runs from 15th to 24th March and our anniversary here at Halsbeer Farm holiday cottages sits bang in the middle of that on 21st March. I can't quite believe we will have been here eight years, living in the farmhouse and running the holiday cottages and Blackdown Yurts. 

I always love the fact that we celebrate our arrival here around the time of the Spring Equinox when the valley feels full of promise for the Spring and Summer seasons ahead, the air is warming and the landscape greening and beginning to bloom.

We open for the season on Good Friday 29th March and are so excited to have returning guests coming back for Easter week celebrating a grandchild's birthday and a 50th wedding anniversary so big congratulations to them. We just love hosting family occasions here at Halsbeer Farm whether you take one cottage, two, three or all four. It gives us such a sense of pride and fulfilment to see people enjoying spending time together in the surroundings we have created and care for. 

We had a lovely surprise last week when a chap knocked at the door with an aerial photo (top) of Halsbeer Farm from 26 years ago before the farmhouse was extended and the cottages were converted and thatched. It also predates the installation of the driveway across the front field. Back in 1998 the only access was from the rear where the yurts are now located down into the farm courtyard between the house and Apple Cottage. At that time what is now the games room was a dairy and the pond was a slurry pond. The building which now houses the swimming pool was an open sided barn and there was a large dutch barn on what is now the front lawn.

The image above was taken in April 2017 by some guests who took all the cottages to celebrate a big birthday party. It shows just how much the farm has changed since 1998.