VISITORS’ BOOK AND GUESTS’ STORIES

Marjorie’s story

I was due to stay in Gloucestershire with my daughter and two grand daughters when the heavens opened and the north of Gloucestershire was flooded. Who would have thought this could happen in the month of July? Water and electricity supplies were cut off with little notice and my daughter’s house was affected. Within three days, we had run out of the water that we had conserved in the bath and the local authority bowser, for filling up drinking water, was a considerable drive away.

So Anthony and Catherine took us into Chipping House (unaffected by the flooding as it is in the south) – all 4 of us – at short notice. We had a splendid time because they let us treat Chipping House as our home, which indeed it was for ten days.

An abiding reminiscence was the memory games that we played every breakfast time, which was a marvellous education for my grand daughters.

Jacques and Ghislaine’s story

My wife and I are French. As I teach English in a lycée, I come to the UK every year to brush up on my language skills.

Way back in 1967 and 1969, I took part in the Bristol-Bordeaux schools’ exchange and stayed in Bristol and Gloucester for two months in total. So Bristol is my chosen place to stay each year. I stock on my English food favourites (Yorkshire tea and HP sauce, for example) at The Mall at Cribbs Causeway and browse the bookshops in Park Street, Broadmead and The Galleries in Bristol.

I have stayed at Chipping House for four years’ running. Anthony and Catherine are very welcoming and, as Catherine speaks fluent French, my wife feels at home.

We shall be back again next year.

John’s story

Walking is my pleasure and, over the years, my trusty walking stick and I have notched up many miles along coastal paths, Scottish and Yorkshire dales and so on. This year, I decided to walk the 102 mile Cotswold Way from Chipping Camden to Bath, which passes through Wotton-under-Edge.

I had booked most of my B&B rooms but didn’t on one or two nights. Arriving in Hawkesbury Upton, the B&B there was fully booked and so I arrived rather worried in Wotton to find a ‘No Vacancies’ sign on Chipping House. Desperate for somewhere to stay, I knocked on the door anyway and Catherine answered. She hadn’t taken any bookings as she was leaving early the next morning to go on holiday.

Realising my dilemma, she let me stay the night. Anyone else might have turned me away. Unbeknown to me, she had had to dash off to the shops to get the breakfast things because, going on holiday the next day, her fridge was bare. What a star!