Having sold the caravan last year, long holidays chasing the sun are no longer an option for us. When we sold the van we decided on a two fold plan to help pass the winter months without having to feel the misery of months and months of dismal wintry weather. Our plan is to fly to Bali once or twice a winter for short breaks in the sun. We’ll only go for a length of time we’re happy to leave our pooch, Mr Tilly, with someone else, which will only about 2 – 3 weeks at most for each trip. The other thing we had planned on doing was embracing the cold by renting some dog friendly accommodation in the cold south west forest areas. The two essential criteria for the accommodation is a fire, something we don’t have in our retirement home, and the other essential criteria is that there needs to be forest walks near by, walks that don’t prohibit dogs because they go through national parks. So many of the forest walks in WA are in national parks where dogs aren’t allowed.

My son said, “yeh, good luck with finding a decent place that allows dogs mum”. I’m pleased to say, he was soooo wrong. We struck gold first time.

Using the Stayz website we started looking. Blue Wren Lodge near Denmark looked pretty good to us. So we booked it. After an enjoyable four hour drive down through undulating farming country, and forest lined roads we arrived at our destination.

We let ourselves in using the locked key box. Wow! How wrong our son was. The house is one of those lovely old character cottages, the type that have been added onto, and changed in all manner of ways. I’ve been trying to work out what the original cottage would have been, and I think it could well have originally been a small two bedroomed cottage with a country kitchen, a small lounge, and a back porch that may have held a small bathroom and a laundry. It’s no longer that small cottage. It’s now a lovely three bedroomed, two bathroom cottage that has two living rooms, a big kitchen, and a seperate dining area over three levels.

Upon letting ourselves in we explored the layout of the house, deciding which bedroom we’d use. The well equipped kitchen was our first welcome surprise. It has a dishwasher and a coffee machine, and the owners have thoughtfully added coffee, tea, sugar, a long life milk in the fridge, and glad wrap, alfoil, and baking paper.

There are two lounges, one with a gas fire, and the other with a slow combustion fire box. The fire was set ready to light, with enough wood for the first night. Outside there’s a wood pile, so although we did bring some wood with us, we didn’t need to. There are also column heaters in two of the bedrooms. We’ve been as warm as toast since we arrived.

There are three bedrooms, one with a queen bed and its own ensuite. The other two, one also with a queen bed, and the other with a set of bunk beds, (bottoms is queen, top bunk is single), share a bathroom. I think these two bedrooms were probably part of the original house. The bathroom they both share has a quirky slate lined shower accessed down several steps. I’ve been trying to work out how the bathroom fitted into the original design, and I think the shower has possibly been added into what may have been a verandah space . If only these walls could talk – but then I wouldn’t have the fun of trying to work it out!

And yes, the owners of Blue Wren Lodge have included shampoo, conditioner and shower wash too. Being a ‘dog friendly’ place has by no means meant we’ve had to rough it. The owners have thought of everything, there are little touches of all sorts of things to make our stay enjoyable. It’s all just lovely!

There’s a few areas outdoors to sit, and every one of the areas looks out to beautiful trees. I think the house is probably on about an acre, it’s all fully fenced so Mr Tilly is safe to wander around exploring. Beyond the wire fences are more trees. I just love it.

The back gate leads to walking tracks.

This morning the skies were blue so we went exploring down the track. An 8 1/2 km circuit (we took a few wrong turns) took us into town where we found the most amazing looking sour dough loaf for our lunch. Home again, and we enjoyed a simple lunch of sour dough and cheese. I diced a few dried apricots and simmered them until they had re-hydrated, then added a big spoonful of home made marmalade to it. With a glass of red, and sitting outside overlooking the trees, we were happy.

Hopefully tomorrow’s weather will also be kind to us and we’ll be able to explore a little more on the walking tracks. I believe the Wilson inlet is not far away. But for now – I found a jig saw amongst the many games and books in the bookcase. I’m less than 1/2 way to completing it, so that’s me occupied for the rest of the evening.