Oak Tree Cottages

Dogfriendly Magazine Review

Read our comprehensive review of this listing printed in our bi-monthly magazine.

Name: The Forge, Oak Tree Cottages
Reviewers: Jeff and Jane Porter

Have I told you how much I hate holidays? The realisation that my everyday routine’s about to be interrupted. When the pointless packing starts, then the pointless unpacking begins, before, the inevitable, repacking and unpacking. Then there’s the getting there, of course. It is is no small feat on Britain’s excuse for a road system – potholes everywhere, roadworks at (almost) every junction, single-file motorways, and not a policeman in sight. My wife says I’m just a grumpy old man. I tend to agree… 

But when you arrive somewhere like Oak Tree Cottages, all is forgotten as you start to relax. You realise all you’ve left behind is ‘work’, and now the closest you’ve got to working is walking the dog, and keeping your phone charged. The Forge is one of four barn conversions that make up Oak Tree Cottages. It’s designed for couples and has everything you could ever want from a holiday home, plus it’s only 2.5 miles to the nearest beach. It’s very simple. There are only two rooms, plus the bathroom, but they are cleverly divided. 

From the doorway you enter the kitchen, which doubles as the boot room, and leads to the lounge area, with the dining space shoehorned in at the end. A stairway leads you to the bedroom, off which is the compact bathroom. The bedroom is big enough to throw a party in. And the bed, well I could sleep for England in that king-size so comfortable is it. 

Outside, there’s a courtyard garden – perfect for late night toilet breaks – which leads out to a playing field for guests’ dogs. It is secure, but if your little escape artist has the nous he will find a way, as would our lurcher, Dotty. A warm shower awaits anyone trying to walk away with half the field on their back.

The Forge is immaculately well designed. Everything has its use, and everything is useful, rather than being dressed up like some coffee table show home. And it would be rude of me not to mention the welcome baskets left for both us and Dotty. Their contents were delicious, including the cookies that went down well with a cuppa and a hot chocolate. And Dotty was equally pleased with her lot. It’s low season when we arrive, so the kids are still at school and we have the place pretty much to ourselves. It’s child free and dog friendly, which is just the way we like it.

Beach spotting was on the cards for day one, so we loaded ourselves into the car and headed to the coast.  Many of the local seaside resorts, we noticed, were more about selling kiss-me-quick hats, rather than the more genteel destinations of west Norfolk. Granted, many of these will fleece you, and leave you to head home with a quaint piece of ‘English’ ware with a ‘Made in China’ label on its underside. Same old tat, just more expensive. 

Besides, I had a specific place in mind, East Runton, not to be confused with where we’re staying, East Ruston. A handful of old slides given to me by my mum, and memories of a childhood long since lost (more than 50 years ago) drove me to search out this part of Norfolk. We’ve been to Cromer a couple of times, but never had we ventured to East Runton. At the time, back in the late 1960s, my family didn’t have a dog, although we had a cat, Topsy – named after a popular loaf of bread at the time. Needless to say, we didn’t take the cat with us, although I imagine we brought a couple of loaves of Topsy along with us for our lunches. 

I remember our caravan being close to the sea, with a road between it and the cliffs. The steep access to the beach. Its wide, open sandy nature. But how things change. Heading north on the coast road, I spot the caravan park on our left, and see it has expanded to cover the clifftop on our right. I drive on in disgust, and my wife turns to our dog, Dotty, and apologises that she won’t be getting out quite yet. 

Cleys beach is up next. It’s dog friendly all the way to Cromer if you head east, we were informed by the car park attendant, while heading west is a designated nature reserve for ground-nesting birds. It’s also covered in pebbles as far as the eye can see, in both directions. So, with the wind howling in from the east, it was hardly a pleasant experience, and we headed back to the car.

Finally, we arrive at Brancaster beach, and what a beach. With solid sand beneath our feet and the wind blowing from the east, but slightly less fiercely than at Cleys, Dotty finally could run free. She ran and ran, chasing after a squeaky ball that my wife and I would take it in turn to throw. She eventually calmed down after half an hour of repeatedly chasing the ball down the beach. We’d noticed only a couple of other dogs, their owners sporadically tossing their balls out for them from behind the shelter of the rocks. After losing my hat a couple of times I wished we’d had the sense to do the same. 

It was nearing lunchtime and we were feeling famished after this morning’s exertions so we continued west to Thornham, and Eric’s, for what have to be ‘the best fish and chips’ in the land! My wife, being vegetarian, had her heart set on chips and Arancini balls, all served with a great dollop of barbecue sauce. Delicious was our verdict, and Dotty indicated the same by licking her lips after scoffing one of Eric’s sausages. 

Now we are back from our travels, it’s worth pointing out that there are a number of local beaches you could try, namely, Happisburgh (pronounced ‘Haze-bruh’), Cart Gap and Walcott, all of which are dog friendly and are recommended by the accommodation We decided to stay closer to home for our second day and opted to go on one of the walks, as recommended by Oak Tree Cottages. We chose the Farmer’s Fields walk, which, at 1.9 miles and a couple of short stretches of road, made us feel like we were at home. This walk is designated ‘easy’ and so it proved, as we arrived back at our accommodation in less than an hour, after a gentle stroll and a quick look at some of our distant neighbours’ properties. 

For lunch, after a quick drive by our chosen destination, The Star Inn (closed and under new management), we headed to the Hill House Inn in Happisburgh. I went for the fish and chips (again) and Jane the vegetable lasagne. Tried & tested Norfolk Neither of them lived up to the previous day’s offering, so we ate as much as we could, paid and left. To be fair, Oak Tree Cottages say their offering is ‘a bit like marmite’. Well, I don’t like marmite, but my wife does! 

After lunch we decided to head to another of the local beaches at Sea Palling. The beach itself reminded me a lot of Brancaster, firm sand underfoot and the fierce wind blowing directly from the east. Dotty got her half hour of ball chasing before we headed back to our car. There’d been no let up in the wind for our entire stay. In fact it has been much the same story this entire summer, apart from a few short weeks in June. It makes last year’s weather all the more memorable.

Just off the beach there was a shop selling hot donuts (and dog treats), so we snagged a couple of bags and headed back to the car, happy to get stuck into another childhood memory.

The Forge, review by Jeff and Jane Porter and appears in DogFriendly magazine issue 79.  For more information on the DogFriendly magazine visit https://www.dogfriendly.co.uk/magazine