THINGS TO DO IN CUMBRIA AND YORKSHIRE DALES
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Cheese and Waterfalls
Who would have thought you could put cheese and waterfalls in the same activity, but if you think about it for a countryside picnic day, it is perfect really. This September we got to visit the Wensleydale Creamery in Hawes, followed by a visit along to Aysgarth to...
Bolton School Reminiscing
We knew when we bought St Marks that it used to belong to Bolton School and we have had many people visiting us and reminiscing about their happy memories of their school retreats here so we thought we would share some of those comments as they are a priceless part of...
Keep That Summer Holiday Feeling
Are you one of the many out there feeling a little sad because the schools have gone back in and the summer holidays are at an end? Well here are our top tips for Keeping That Summer Holiday Feeling alive. The point of starting St Marks was to live a life that is not...
Why Not Alpacas
If we had your interest in the title of Why Not Alpacas, then you are going to love this blog post. In our early days of driving back to the house in Cautley, Joanne was sure she had seen alpacas in a field and then what do you know, she came across local company Why...
Beach Life
When you come from Leicester, which is 2 hours minimum from any coast, you really miss a beach life. So moving to Cumbria and being only 40 minutes, or an hour away from the seaside, it is wonderful. We had previously stayed in Morecambe and been treated to a stunning...
Your Self Catering Kitchen
Everybody oohs and aarhs over a new kitchen so as part of our renovations here at St Marks Stays we wanted to make sure your self catering kitchen was one you would look forward to being in, as part of your stay with us. Here is the transformation. Our first early...
Transforming your living room
Everybody knows how to decorate and so we will simply let the before and after images tell the story of how we went about transforming St Marks living room for us and you. From ripping up the carpet, sanding floors, hoovering cobwebs off ceilings, choosing dark...
The Fabulous Quilting Ladies
Well what can we say about our very first guests to St Marks Stays, apart from we may have to name them, The Fabulous Quilting Ladies! We love them so much we are dedicating this blog post to them and know they won’t mind us sharing their talents with you all. To take...
What we learned from moving from the city to the country
We both come from small towns and then lived life from university onwards in the now well known, thanks to a dead king and a football team, city of Leicester. Neither of us had ever lived in the country and so not only were we moving house, moving counties, relocating...
Walking Cautley Spout
We have an absolute luxury here at St Marks Stays in that we have a walking route to Cautley Spout Waterfall right here on our doorstep. The highest waterfall in England is worth a visit and whether you take Damian as your walking guide, or simply visit the bottom of...
Walking Cautley to Sedbergh
What are summers for, but to take advantage of the sunny weather when we get it in the UK and the evenings being light enough to hang outside in. We recently decided to take advantage of this and head out on a Sunday evening to go walking from Cautley to Sedbergh....
Lessons on Renovating
We knew even when we were viewing St Marks that we would be picking up a lot of lessons on renovating and in the short space of time we already have quite a few tips and tricks on decorating a house. Even though this Vicarage from 1872 did not need any big...
Yorkshire Dales Cycling
We knew the Yorkshire Dales National Park was a haven for cycling due to a sticker in the window when we moved in saying, ‘Cyclists Welcome’, but with our limited knowledge and only having one mountain bike between us, we needed our cyclist friends from the Isle of...
Being Pet Friendly
One of our priorities for St Marks Stays was about it being pet friendly because we had struggled in the past to find the right places to travel with our cocker spaniel. So opening our home to other dogs was important to us. As St Marks Stays is on a country road we...
Why the lifestyle change?
If you already know us, or are following the blog to learn more about Damian and Joanne, you probably all have the question of, why the lifestyle change? This is a huge change and journey for us and it has probably been in our heads since 2011. Although people only...
Welcome to our journey
Welcome to our journey. Welcome to St Marks Stays and we already love you in that you are interested to follow our journey, our lifestyle and our stories here at St Marks. On our blog we will be sharing with you all about life in our gorgeous Victorian property here...