Tara, a stunning Historic log Farmhouse in Europe’s biggest Nature Reserve

The Perfect Place For That Big Family Reunion The Experience Tara is a magical historic Farmhouse set in a beautiful Beskydy mountain nature reserve. A short hop away from London’s Stansted Airport by Ryanair, Tara is just 50 minutes from Ostrava Airport. Tara is a wonderful place to take a big extended family group, with lots of character, space and views, even a touch of luxury. Lonely Planet’s Magazine ‘Traveller’ chose Tara itself as one of ‘Europe’s 30 Ultimate Winter Experiences’. Traveller Magazine is the Travel Magazine of the Year Cottage walk through Tara is very spacious at 410 square meters of living space, but we prefer to restrict the number of guests to 10-12 adults which easily fits in to the 6 bedrooms and doesn’t include 4 people having an afternoon snooze on top of the wonderful sheep skin covered oven. The house is ideal for large family groups as it has 6 bedrooms, 3 upstairs but the rest along with all other rooms are on the ground floor, ideal for guests that are less than fully mobile. You enter the Farmhouse through the front door into a long hallway with benches to change shoes, (shoe warming rack supplied) coat hangers and a washroom with a toilet. This leads into the main square hallway off which is the large bathroom with a big double sized shower, 2 wash basins a loo, washing machine and a dryer. The Hallway has a large American type fridge / freezer to add to the refrigerating capacity of the kitchen fridge. Off this hall is also a sweet single bedroom with an antique farmer’s bed and moss insulated log walls, the window overlooks the pretty meadow. The Hall leads through into a TV room with a big sofa and TV with 300 satellite channels and a small library of books and DVD’s. A lovely open wood staircase winds up round the sofa to the first floor 3 bedrooms. A door off the TV room leads to another downstairs bedroom we call the Princess bedroom because of the pretty 4 poster single Princess bed there. Leading on from the Princess bedroom is a cosy double bedroom with a king-sized bed, log walls, and windows on 2 sides. Also off the TV room is a doorway leading onto the 40 foot balcony which are opened up for most of the year to afford beautiful panoramic views across the forest valley all the way to Slovakia. The Balcony has tables and chairs for guests to enjoy eating in the fresh air or watching the wildlife from, or simply relaxing on and taking in the amazing views into the far distance with not a house or road in sight. Also off the TV room is the very large main room which is the heart of the house. It has two big tables, benches and chairs enough for 12 people, there is a big comfy sofa and the wonderful Farmers-oven which has a staircase up to its top where there is room for 4 people to lie down and get slowly cooked, children love it. The main room leads round to a very well-equipped kitchen complete with two electric hobs with 6 hot plates, an electric oven, a beautiful farmer’s wood-fired hotplate and oven, a dishwasher, fridge, microwave and double sink. The kitchen also has one end a bench seated farmer’s table for a few people to have breakfast or keep the cook company. Upstairs there is a hallway with a sunny area with a table and chairs and library of books to read. Off this hallway is the big four poster bedroom with two sofa’s one of which can be made up in case kids want to sleep in Mum’s room. Also off the hallway is small double bedroom and the very big family bedroom. The family bedroom has a king-sized bed and two antique single farmer’s beds, there is also a permanent large wooden cot. Sleeping Capacity: First Floor sleeping 4: A Big family bedroom with a King-sized double bed and 2 single beds sleeping 2: A small bedroom with a double bed Sleeping 2 (4): A large Bedroom with a big four poster bed and a sofa bed good for 2 children Ground Floor Sleeping 2: A double bedroom Sleeping 1: A single bedroom (leading through to the double bedroom) Sleeping 1 A single bedroom Total 12 guests maximum but 2 small children could sleep in the four poster sofa bed rather than in their own bedrooms. Well behaved doggies are welcome in this cottage - dog charges apply at £25 pw or £15 less than a week. The house stands in its own meadows of about 20 acres, all around is wonderful forest and the views from the veranda look straight across the valley and left and right for about 12 miles – there is no sign of a house, light, telegraph pole, road or civilisation at all – it is a wonderful forest nature reserve But… not completely cut off! The house was the focus of a tiny community of mountain farmers and there are about 8 houses, mostly ancient within 1.5 kilometres nestled into meadows in the forest. The closest is behind Tara by a few hundred yards and where our Czech friends live Next door is our large Barn which is also used sometimes by my family, so if you need help there is always a friendly face to look after you. Garden The house stands in its own meadows of about 20 acres, all around is wonderful forest and the views from the veranda look straight across the valley and left and right for about 12 miles – there is no sign of a house, light, telegraph pole, road or civilisation at all – it is a wonderful forest nature reserve where only those people who actually live in it can travel around by car, everyone else has to walk, so very few cars and no tourist feel to the place. We have an orchard and meadow below Tara and 2 ponds to attract wildlife. We have made a traditional wood store shed where you can take fuel for the Farmer’s Oven or your BBQ, or just sit outside on the bench and take in the lovely views. We also have a purpose made BBQ Barn which is a big hit with our guests, the Barn has a built in BBQ which tables and benches, we have lit it up with fairy lights and the views from the Barn are just gorgeous. We have placed benches and tables near the ponds and under Tara so people can easily find a quite spot to enjoy the peace and quiet of this lovely location. Wild animals have free access to our meadows, so at dawn and sunset you will see deer, in Spring maybe a dozen hares. At night you may hear wild pigs and badgers and I have seen Lynx but these are all rather shy creatures. Here is a list of the wonderful birds and animals that you can see at Tara link We are fine with guests bringing well behaved doggies but they should not chase the deer and kept close in the forest. Outside You are in one of the last Primeval Forests in Europe, it stretches over 3 countries and in total is an amazing 12,000 square miles. The Beskydy part alone is 450 square miles. The forest is criss-crossed by forest logging roads which while not being open to traffic except for access to the homes of the people who live in the forest (you have a permit for access to Tara), these roads are great for exploring by bicycle. You can hire bikes at the local ski resort; Bila, which is just 3 km away. There are footpaths and I provide my own map showing guests how to get to the top of the mountain where there is a hotel restaurant/café and a High-Alm road leading you along the top of the Mountain past the lovely wooden church from where there are amazing views over forest all the way to the High Tara Mountains in Poland. If you love nature, bird watching, animal watching, fresh air, beautiful views, amazing black night skies, memorable BBQ’s, walking, cycling, and great cheap food then this is a place to thrill you. Local Area Tara is situated in the middle of the famous Beskydy Mountain Nature Reserve in the Czech Republic close to the massive Sance reservoir lake and with views of the Slovak and Polish borders in the NE corner of the Czech Republic. This is an area which is visually beautiful with a rich history and many interesting places to visit or just experience nature in its grandeur right on your doorstep. It is a wonderful place to visit in Winter when the snow covers everything but we think it is even better in the summer when the forest comes to life and it is easier to explore this lovely area. The nearest village is Bila (3 km away) which has ski-lifts to take skiers in Winter or Cyclists in summer to the top of the mountain. You can hire bikes for adults and scooters for children at the ski lift and go on a 6 km easy downhill run on the tiny forest lane – or follow a cross country course or explore the marked trails and footpaths for as many miles or days you want to. At Bila there is also a lovely kids play area with climbing, sliding, trampolining and forest adventure park with zip wires (and a good cafe to sit and watch them Roznov is just a 25 minute drive away past 3 little villages and it is here that the famous Skansem Museum village is – this is a special place to visit and the many houses in the village square or up in the farming community are brought to life not only with their perfect historic interiors but re-enactors who will explain to you have life was lived in these houses way back in history. Skansem also has 4 working water and wind mills you can visit and there are frequent fairs, craft markets and traditional festivals held there where the local young men and women try to outdo one another in traditional dress and dance. Kids and Ninja’s of all ages love to go to Tazania and Trojanovice – it has an amazing series of tree top assault courses and you can take the ski lift up from here to Pustevni (another big favourite) and cycle or scoot all the way back – which is a long way ! I have put a lot of photos and information about all the wonderful places to visit, the forest, Historic Villages, cycling, horse riding, skiing, children’s activities and masses more on my ‘Discover Stare Hamry’ pages. Please have a look at them here and more information can be found on this link This is