Alpine, Cornwall
Why we chose Cornwall, why we chose Alpine and our plans for our forever home.
If you’ve read my previous blogs, you’ll know that our move wasn’t planned for months and years, we had a dream, created a vision board then life changed much quicker than we expected and within three months of accepting jobs we were here. Lee wanted to move to Cornwall because “it’s nice isn’t it”. However, I wanted to feel as good as I do on holiday, doesn’t everyone? When I’m on holiday, strangely I am at my healthiest; lots of fresh food, sunlight, sleep, pain is eased by the heat, rest, reading and exercising outdoors, not forgetting beautiful views of the sea. Time is too precious to only feel this healthy for a few weeks of the year, so I made a commitment to my health to create a lifestyle that gave me all the greatness from a holiday at home (that’s why our interior plans are inspired by hotels) and Cornwall brings this opportunity and has always held treasured memories. Obviously one thing that we do that you don’t on holiday is work, however we can if we choose to, be on the beach enjoying a picnic for tea from 3:30pm. We’ve nailed our work and life rhythm and I feel at my strongest.
So why did we choose a house that needs renovating? Rest and renovating do not make a perfect pairing however in our case, they do. Lee drove past Alpine on his first day here in August 2020, it had been saved in our Rightmove favourites for months but had sold. We were staying in a holiday let that we’d booked until Christmas, we imagined we would be extending that agreement as we thought it would be wise to take our time and get to know areas. Thank goodness that wasn’t the case, as I imagine we would have struggled to find somewhere now! I also thought it was going to be a nightmare compromising, this was the first house I was buying with someone else with their own list of requirements. As a result, we were laid back in our house hunt, we had a list of essentials, (parking, not overlooked, 20 minutes’ drive from a beach), desirables (1 level living, 20 minutes’ walk from the beach, garden space) and even better if (large garden, sea view). Our lists were created with our lifestyle in mind, so mostly dictated location and not the aesthetics of a house. Appearance wise we quite fancied a cottage or barn providing the ceilings weren’t too low but found most of these were on main roads or so rural that going food shopping would take over two hours. We were taking it slowly and whilst we drove past many houses, we only viewed three that met the essentials, then in September Alpine came back on the market. Lee, having driven past before, was excited and almost ready to offer before we even viewed it, but I was apprehensive as I didn’t know the area at all, it needed renovating and it was on the market at just over our budget.
We drove to the house before arranging a viewing and I immediately saw why Lee was so keen. A few days later I drove from work to meet Lee and Karen (the estate agent) and had a strange feeling; I felt calm, I felt like I was driving home. I didn’t feel like I was in a competitive situation where we needed to bolster ourselves for a battle with other prospective buyers. The house was listed for sale with Karen Trace, an independent estate agent, and was vacant with no onward chain. Chatting to Karen during our viewing was a very different experience to what we’d had previously. We knew there were other people viewing the house and we were honest with Karen, she asked me if I could picture myself living in the house, I told her I could picture our wedding in the garden! After our first viewing we had a walk on the beach which is just five minutes on foot and tried to calm the f down. We followed that with a second viewing, then an ice cream in Charlestown and we were absolutely sold on Alpine (Lee was VERY excited). We made an offer and Karen kept us informed with other prospective buyers and the position of the vendor, time seemed to drag between negotiations but the whole time we felt at ease and had this deeply positive feeling that Alpine was our new home so when our offer was accepted it felt like a formality, a box that was ticked, of course it was ours.
With super organisation we managed to complete on the purchase a week before Christmas, our furniture and possessions couldn’t come from storage in Sheffield for a little longer, so we spent a few long days slapping some paint on the walls and cleaning the carpets, then we moved in on Christmas Eve. Lees parents came to help, and his dad put the tree up for us at 11pm on Christmas Eve. We intended to cook the dinner but after a walk on the beach we collapsed in the lounge and Lees parents were the first to cook in the kitchen.
Before I move on, I’ll share my tips for making a big move to a new county:
1. The logistics can be a huge stress, if you remove expectation about this it’ll be far easier. We decided holiday lets as an interim solution was far less stressful than trying to organise our sale and purchase to complete together. If you can do this it will be a relief.
2. Get to know locations as quickly as you can. We spent our weekends and evenings driving all over the place with a notebook in hand! Walk around the areas, go to the supermarkets, and eat in local hot spots.
3. Connect with as many local estate agents as you can, they are experts on areas and have knowledge you can tap into for free.
4. Create a list of what you require for your new life and style. Location is often the biggest factor in determining your lifestyle, once you know what’s important in every day, you’ll be able to filter out the properties that do/don’t work for you. You could even make a vision board to help you (see my previous post on vision boards).
If you are on the move around Cornwall, or moving into the county, and would like to ask any questions please drop them at the bottom or send me a message, I'd be more than happy to help.
What was it about Alpine that made it the one? Firstly, it met the essentials, desirables and one of the even better if’s (we can see the sea from our road so almost)! Secondly, we had that feeling that we were in the right place (house hunting is very emotive, you should trust your gut instinct). The black carpet in the bathroom, striking teak kitchen, and dated décor didn’t change how we felt, and the view of the garden would always make this house feel very special. Our home needs to undergo structural changes to best function for us and suit our lifestyle at home (did I mention I like a bath in the bedroom), however for now we have given it a lick of paint and brought in the things we love, and everything works (ish). We can cook delicious meals (or go to the beach and have vegan burgers from Jusu Kitchen followed by raspberry blondies from Manor Made Cornwall), we have a restful bedroom, the beach and beautiful walks, bike rides and kayak trips are accessible from the door and a lot of the time we feel just like we’re on holiday. We are so lucky!
At the moment we are living our new slower life, sometimes we have to remind ourselves that we are human beings and not human doings. We don’t have to be doing, doing, doing all the time, it’s nice, necessary even, to relax and just be. See how things unfold. We’ve spent some time figuring out what we’d like to change and studying the light in and around the house and we’re now meeting architects so we can begin to design our forever home. We’ve gone back to our essentials, desirables and even better if, requirements and we’re adding to this every week. We know for future proofing with my disability in mind that we will extend out rather than up, the location of the new bedroom with bath has been decided and we’re playing with the space around the house to determine a new spot for a kitchen. Ultimately, we hope to have a four ‘room’ bungalow with open plan living, kitchen diner and utility with a garden that allows us to be outside all year. I use the word ‘room’ as the clever thing with bungalows is the identity of a room can be flexible as they’re all on one level; what could be a bedroom could also be an office, snug or playroom. This flexibility would allow our home to evolve as we do too. Vision is something I have in abundance, and it wakes me up in the middle of the night, right down to the details of which way a door should open and on which walls there needs to be plug points. Our last extension and renovation was designed and completed quite quickly, for Alpine there is no rush. We are exactly where we’re supposed to be.
Charlotte
