Let me give you a little tour of The Summer Folly.
We're in Lincolnshire. We're in 3,000 acres of English countryside, a patchwork of earthy browns and the greenest greens. It's the last sunny weekend of the summer. The sky is full of birds.
The folly's front door leads into the beautiful country kitchen (where the men do the cooking) and the fancy-pants dining room (where us women do the eating). On the table are homemade cakes and biscuits baked by the housekeeper who lives in the cottage nearby.
Up the spiral staircase is the sitting room, wood fire blazing, stacks of vintage books waiting to be read, walls and ceilings hand-painted with intricate murals; the story of the previous tenants' life, including a sort of pictorial love letter from husband to late wife.
The bedrooms and bathrooms are that perfect mix of posh and comfy, the views out the windows spectacular; in the distance is Grimsthorpe Castle. The family who lived in the castle in the 1700s built the folly as their holiday home (they were doing staycations before staycations were even invented). Between here and there, across the owners' farmland, down by the big lake, my dog Lenny decides this is all his territory now. He patrols the place day and night with his football in his mouth and begins a complicated love-hate relationship with the garden's robotic lawnmower.
Opposite the folly is another little building, the snug, a sort of cinema room with a huge comfy corner sofa. This is where our friends' young daughter spends all her time. She calls it her "holiday house" and insists we do the same.
Behind the folly is the garden patio; the barbecue's going, the music's playing, the sun's setting, and a wedge of geese are hooting across the sky.
The building and the surroundings are beautiful, magical, but it's much more than that. It's all the little things; it's the furniture, the books on the shelves and the pictures on the walls; it's how the owner and the housekeeper pop round to introduce themselves and stay to chat as if we're not customers but their new neighbours.
The Summer Folly is by far the best holiday home I've ever stayed in. Why? Because you almost forget you're on your holidays and start to feel right at home.
