“First impressions of The Shippon were beautiful a building with Idlic surroundings.”
Waking up to rolling countryside was lovely.
Inside the property it was beautiful, clean and comfortable.
We arrived in hot weather. It soon became apparent that the sun shone through the double glass doors until sunset. Which is absolutely fine, but a roller blind covered both doors. Meaning you have to have both doors closed to have the roller blind down (which made the living space unbelievably hot) or have both doors open with the blind up which also made the property too hot to sit in ...
Waking up to rolling countryside was lovely.
Inside the property it was beautiful, clean and comfortable.
We arrived in hot weather. It soon became apparent that the sun shone through the double glass doors until sunset. Which is absolutely fine, but a roller blind covered both doors. Meaning you have to have both doors closed to have the roller blind down (which made the living space unbelievably hot) or have both doors open with the blind up which also made the property too hot to sit in. This made things uncomfortable in the property, so the only option you had was to sit outside in the full Sun. No parasol was provided. No fan was provided for inside the property. Which I think for the comfort of visitors in the summer is the bare minimum.
There was also no welcome pack. Just a small bottle of milk which was disappointing. As every property we have stayed in previously has given some local produce to enjoy, which is always welcome. Little things in the kitchen like foil and salt and pepper wouldn’t go amiss.
Also worth noting the tap water is yellow, due to being supplied by a spring. This wasn’t on the welcome information and had us a little worried and we had to contact the owner late at night to address this.
Kathryn and John are lovely hosts. Just a few adjustments would have made a perfect stay. Overall we had a lovely stay at Wyke Farm. We would recommend with a few doable tweaks :)
Hello, We are sorry to see that you felt uncomfortable during your stay. Regarding welcome pack, we provide tea, coffee and milk. Starter quantities of loo rolls, tea towels, handwash, shampoo, dishwash tabs, cloths etc. We usually provide flowers cut from our own garden, but had not owing to the recently dry conditions and having little to cut (we don’t think ‘garage’ out of season blooms are in order). We used to put more welcome items in, but find that people often leave them. For perishable items, such as butter, this is wasteful. To be frank, 50% of guests don’t use the milk we supply nowadays. And we generally try to clear out store cupboard items left by other guests, as we can’t be held responsible for the suitability for consumption of any items left by others. However, our salt and pepper mills should have been full and we shall check and top up accordingly on next changeover. We do put foil, baking paper and cling film on at the start of the season, and check periodically for top ups. It is so difficult to get everything just right, as different guests appreciate different things, and the nature of the self catering unit is really that you will have to nip to the shops (1 mile) to get the kind of things which you know you use. The period of your stay was not particularly hot, but we appreciate that the Shippon patio receives sun from early afternoon to sunset. We don’t really know why the blind/door combination was a problem. We did have a fan, which we could have given you (we provided them the previous week to guests as it was very hot). We ask all of guests to let us know if we can do anything to assist throughout their stay. You are correct that we didn’t have a parasol. We used to have one, but a sharp gust of wind had damaged it, and the nearby table. We now have a new parasol on order. We understand that the tap water has a tinge to it, noticeable when pouring larger quantities, but it is not unsafe to drink or use.
Property Owner
