Time For A Change
A unique find amongst Shepton Mallet’s muddle of manors, mills and cottages.

Time for a change! Five years ago, after what seemed like forever living a London/Tunbridge Wells commuter life style and with our daughters now grown up and reasonably settled, we decided to sell up and head off to the South West. We felt that by combining my hotel experience and especially Gill’s artistic ability, buying an attractive property and running it as a bed and breakfast would provide a good alternative to our previous life. With money in the bank, we rented a small house in Exeter and set off each day with a flask of coffee to search for a bed and breakfast. We spent that winter seeing a lot of the beautiful South West with its ever changing landscape, but finding the right property seemed elusive.

We had a list of criteria. The property couldn’t be in an area that would be too seasonal tourists wise. It would also have to be accessible but not on any main road and ideally it should have separate owner’s accommodation. The year passed quickly and just when we were losing hope we were invited over to see friends in Bath. To justify the visit we lined up a few properties to view en-route and one of them was Maplestone, situated up a little lane on the edge of town in Shepton Mallet in Somerset…