View from balcony
Our motor boat
Living Room
We are offering for home exchange a nice house in Dartmouth with parking and spectacular views. We also have a small motor boat you can use.
The house is located in the sunniest part of Dartmouth and faces south. It is therefore very bright, sunny and warm. We have fine views from both from our living room and our balcony - 180 degrees around from the balcony.
Things to do
Devon is a very beautiful part of the UK and has masses of tourist attractions and places to visit. There are swimming beaches a short drive away and excellent walks many from the door. Without using a car you can
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take a boat trip to Totnes which is a very pretty town and a lovely journey,
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walk upriver to a pub at a village called Dittisham catching a small ferry boat back,
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take our motor boat upriver for a fry up on a beach or a meal in a pub or cafe,
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walk around the coast to a nice pub called the Green Dragon for lunch,
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walk to Coleton Fishacre (perhaps the prettiest National Trust property anywhere),
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visit Greenway House (once owned Agatha Christie and gifted by her son to the National Trust) - take a small ferry from the town or walk,
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go on a guided tour of Britannia Royal Naval College,
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catch a steam train to Paignton from Kingswear.
We have carefully prepared map extracts with instructions on suggested walks which start and finish from the house. These walks are of varying length and many include lunch part way round. This guide has been much praised by swappers who have stayed here.
Just being here is nice enough, see a good set of local photos in a new window here: Dartmouth Photos
It is a short walk from our house to the centre of Dartmouth which is very pretty and full of interesting shops and restaurants. Its a downhill walk and it takes about 5 minutes down and then 10 minutes back up. The up trip is a 2 minute bus ride if feeling lazy or carrying shopping. Food shopping is easiest done at Sainsburys by car, 5 minutes drive from the house.
We have a small motor boat which you may use. We have a set of instructions for dealing with the boat which has photos of everything you need to do - quite a few people have used it without previous experience of boats. We have some kayaks you can use if you have some experience. Do note that all boats are used at your own risk.
opens in new window: video clip of motor boat
View from Sun Lounge
If you want to be entertained then a day or two on a course learning to dinghy sail is possible at Dittisham, or there are lots of yachting schools that will take you out to sea and teach you how to be a competent crew. There is a RIB school which teaches driving fast inflatable type speedboats. Fishing trips and kayaking instruction are possible. If you tell us what might interest you we can make enquiries locally.
Dartmouth has several minor attractions like Dartmouth Castle, Dartmouth Museum and a very large Newcomens Engine (these were the first ever coal powered engines with pistons). There are five different ferries pedestrians can use and lots of short walks can be made up which make use of them.
By car one can get easily to Dartmoor National Park (1hr), Torquay (45mins), Plymouth (1hr) or Exeter (1 hr).
Parking
We have two level parking spaces by our front door so parking is very easy.
Us
We are Christine (51) and Tim (50) Freeman. We run a small property development business from an office within the house. The business builds houses in North Devon with a staff of six. Christine is also treasurer of the local arts centre and cinema, called the Flavel Centre. Tim also runs the local Canoe Club in the town. We have around 45 swaps behind us (we've actually lost count) spread over 25 years or so but we have not long ago moved house and this is our second year of swapping from this house. We do have two sons: Nicholas (25) lives in Oxford and is near the end of a PhD in Maths - Matthew (22) is in the last year of an engineering degree at Oxford and is joining the Navy for officer training in 2012 - neither is likely to be with us when we are house swapping as they usually have their own holiday plans.
Misc
We have the usual appliances: ceramic hob, dishwasher, microwave, washing machine, tumble drier, broadband you can use. There is also a 100X magnification telescope for zooming in on boats (or the moon). There is no TV as we like a quiet house, but bring some DVDs and you can watch them on our laptop. We really prefer UK swaps.
Contacts
tel (0) 1803 832663
4 Thurlestone Gardens Dartmouth TQ6 9HG
Tim & Christine Freeman
see also http://www.discoverdartmouth.com/ www.discoverdevon.com link to more page 2 with more photos
Living Room from other end