A new find from a stylish gay-friendly website is a smart but cosy B&B in ever-popular Hay-on-Wye
Accommodation websites seldom provide inspiration for this column, but this week I'm plugging Further Afield (furtherafield.com). The site has had little national coverage because its creators, Simon Forrester and Andrew Craven, are not self-promoters, but we swap excited tip-offs (hey, race you to this one!) on email all the time. Every establishment on their site (there are just 230 of them) fits their style criteria. Oh, and they must also be gay-friendly – which simply means the owners are nice, unprejudiced people who put avocado in their salads, not their bathrooms.
So here I am, at their latest UK listing, The Bear, in lovely Hay-on-Wye, breathing Welsh mountain air and tripping round to the front door from the tiny car park. Owner David Gibbon, a former civil servant who refurbished this ancient inn-turned-B&B last year, opens the door. Ooh, he's so nervous it's making me nervous. (I can't forget one Welsh hotelier who followed me everywhere and, when I rang for early morning tea, appeared behind the waitress, trying to make conversation at the crack of dawn at my bedroom door.)
David shows me the beamed sitting and breakfast room, with its woodburner, smart grey sofa and pile of Sunday papers. It's stylish in a spartan, maybe modern Welsh, way. Up the elm staircase, past a little snug, we reach a small double with separate bathroom, then a rear twin room with en suite. I detect no bathrobes, so in case I've not packed my best PJs, I pick the twin.
Wrought-iron beds with bright Welsh blankets, and a mix of mid-century modern and antique furnishings. Tea and coffee things are basic but the smoky grey and oak bathroom has Arran Aromatics toiletries in a perspex box (but no conditioner, which any girl will tell you is essential). I overlook the courtyard garden. Won't be sitting out just yet – it's trying to snow.
Later, comfy as my bed is, the duvet's too thin. I peer into a box beneath the coffee table hoping for a hot water bottle, but no joy. The heating comes on as I'm waking, so I sit tight for a while, until my room warms up, shower, and head for breakfast, annoyingly only served till 9.30am. Ooh, primary-coloured china from hip Shoreditch home store SCP – makes a nice change. How did I sleep, asks David. I tell him. Turns out he's just switched to spring-weight duvets – I'd have been snug as anything last week.
This quiet, three-room B&B is his first run. If all goes well, David says, he might take on something larger. How do you keep the rhubarb pink, I ask, spooning up compote with thick yoghurt. Little Hereford (cheese) and leek tart as vegetarian cooked option is a hit too, with lashings of lovely toast and tea.
So there it is – a double whammy. Cool website. New option for Hay. Don't say I don't look after you.