This Side of the Pond

Property moguls with exotic taste and some cash to splash may be interested in a special something now available on the outskirts of my home town. The property itself is a delight of traditional architecture, but its true appeal is something you won’t find anywhere else.

Located in a secluded back yard, the white-bricked exterior with thatched roof hides a recently renovated selection of rooms, each spacious and modern with a huge amount of storage but also touches of the old world, such as wood burners and exposed timber beams. If you’re willing to keep up on your thatch maintenance, it’s an investment by anyone’s standards.

But the person who purchases this cottage is likely to be of a romantic nature, because its previous occupants were a giant sidestep from the norm. This beautiful home is where Goldilocks performed experiments on bed size.

Yes, the cottage was the inspiration for the tale of a little girl and three bears, the latter of whom I feel were perfectly justified in wishing she’d keep her mucky fingers out of their porridge bowls. It was once the home of Robert Southey, the Poet Laureate who penned the famous bedtime story.

It’s yours for just $1.2 million, which I would call pretty cheap to live inside your very own fairytale. As we’ve long since gotten rid of all the bears that lived on Britain’s isles, these days you can test all the mattresses in peace.

If that doesn’t appeal, it turns out that there are all sorts of hidden gems dotted around the county of my birth. I thought the one I used to drive past on the way to school that had a multi-colored roof, glass walls and a statue of a cow on the balcony was the oddest property in town, but I was wrong.

If a bear den doesn’t appeal, there’s an adorable one-bedroom house in the Dorset countryside that was built as a lodge house for an estate and is still surrounded by two acres of woodland. It’s round and pale green with its own thatched roof, has a single-stack chimney and features the kind of windows you’d expect to see in a period movie about King Arthur.

Inside, the antiquated furniture and strangely shaped rooms would definitely appeal to a hobbit, but others have also shown an interest. It once belonged to the family of the man who inspired the character of James Bond and was also a hideaway for Augustus John, a flamboyant Welsh artist known for his portraits of such figures as Lawrence of Arabia, W.B. Yeats and Thomas Hardy.

There are, of course, plenty of other quirky homes you can visit across the county, but most of them aren’t for sale. You could spend time at Lawrence of Arabia’s cottage in Wareham, for instance, in the pleasingly named parish of Turners Puddle. You might wander the halls of Sherborne Castle, built in 1594 by Sir Walter Raleigh, a favorite of Elizabeth I best known for bringing tobacco back from the New World.

Sad to say that most of these places are already occupied or have been snapped up by the National Trust to be preserved as historical sites. Still, if you’re thinking of a visit, you needn’t restrict yourself to the usual boring hotel room with white towels and miniature shampoo dispensers.

Available now through online lodging marketplaces are plenty of jewels of the coast, such as a luxury yacht in Poole that features three cabins for six guests, panoramic views and a spacious flybridge.

This boat is one of the Sunseekers you will find in glossy magazines with starlets and models draped across the deck in their bikinis. It’s the biggest in the marina and yours for just $800 a night, though you might be disappointed to hear you’re not allowed to drive it anywhere, so you won’t be popping to the south of France in search of paparazzi.

If that’s a little outside your budget, a smaller version is available for a modest $120 per night. It’s a powerboat rather than a luxury yacht, so there’s about enough space for three people and a dog to stand in the cockpit, and you’ll sleep in a “cabin” that I would more readily refer to as “a cupboard”.

On the other hand, the owner does offer a “turn down service”, but you will need to be elsewhere when this is done because you’re never going to fit two people in the sleeping area.

Still not convinced? How about a log cabin similar to any you might see in the Bighorns, albeit of different wood, which looks out over one of my favorite beaches instead of the mountains.

Or a six-bedroom house with butler, private chauffeur and maid located in the Sandbanks area of Poole. Its $2000-per-night price tag is an absolute steal for the area, which boasts the most expensive coastal real estate on the planet in terms of square feet (it’s an 850-foot row of 13 houses that are collectively worth $120 million).

Farmhouses listed on the historical register, picturesque country cottages, seaside retreats with views of the Jurassic coastline. There are certainly advantages to a location that fits city, countryside and coast within its borders and runs the gamut in architectural terms from ancient to ultra modern.

Personally I’d have a problem choosing the one I liked best. On the other hand, it occurs to me that the house with a cow on the balcony might be available to rent, so I think I’ll just hold out for that one.