The Good Hotel Guide review for The Old Rectory, St Juliot, Boscastle

'Our breakfast menu changes daily according to what we have in the garden,' write Chris and Sally Searle, the 'warmly welcoming' owners of this 'most unusual' B&B. Served at a communal table, it might, in August, include home-grown peaches, loganberries, gooseberries and mushrooms. Free-range eggs and locally baked bread, bacon and sausages come with Fairtrade tea and coffee. The house, in this hamlet near Boscastle, has a special resonance for lovers of Thomas Hardy: the architect/writer stayed here in the 1870s while planning the restoration of the adjacent church. He fell in love with the rector's sister-in-law, Emma Lavinia Gifford, and they married in 1874. She inspired some of his finest poetry, and his novel A Pair of Blue Eyes is set partly in the rectory, as Endelstow vicarage: the conservatory which he described still stands. There are three bedrooms in the house: Mr Hardy's has an antique carved double bed; The Rector's, a double and a single bed; Emma's has a four-poster. The first two share a bathroom; the last has a shower and the original thunderbox loo. There is also a double room, with a 'magnificent wood stove', in 'wonderfully restored' stables. You should say, when booking, if you prefer sheets and blankets to a duvet. Guests have their own sitting room (with a fire, fruit, and a newspaper except on Sunday). Indian Runner ducks patrol the garden. There are good walks from the door; a safe, sandy beach is ten minutes' drive away; Lanhydrock and Cotehele (both National Trust), the Heligan Gardens and the Eden Project are all within an hour's drive. More reports, please