A new story unfolds
IT’S nearly 100 years since the first Winnie-the-Pooh stories were published but the release of new film Christopher Robin today will have all ages reminiscing about their own childhood adventures. The film stars Ewan McGregor as an adult Christopher Robin working in London with little time for his own family when Winnie-the-Pooh crashes back into his life and he rediscovers the importance of the Hundred Acre Wood, his old friends and, of course, his own family.
Winnie-the-Pooh author AA Milne bought Cotchford Farm near Ashdown Forest in East Sussex because he wanted to escape London and be close to the countryside.
It’s a dream that many urban dwellers all over the UK still hold dear.
And it’s not an impossible dream. Just a few miles away from where the Milne family spent their weekends, in the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, is the town of Crowborough, on the A26 between Tunbridge Wells and Lewes with trains to London Bridge and Uckfield.
Just over a mile outside town, Millwood Designer Homes is building 18 three, four and five-bedroom houses at Coppice End, designed in traditional High Weald style with timber weatherboarding and clay roof tiles.
The homes, which start from £380,000 (01732 770991; millwooddesignerhomes. co.uk) are within walking distance of the railway station – trains take just over an hour to London – and Ashdown Forest is just six miles away.
By coincidence, writer Sir Arthur Conan Doyle moved to the outskirts of Crowborough in 1907 and from his garden summer house wrote Sherlock Holmes stories that featured local areas such as Groombridge Place – now known to visitors for its gardens and “enchanted” forest.
Among Doyle’s short stories about Sherlock Holmes is The Adventure of the Missing Three-Quarter, set in Cambridge where AA Milne studied mathematics at Trinity College. He would have known of the Gog Magog Hills in pancake-flat Cambridgeshire, although the county is not known for its forests.
New woodlands are being created in a 120-acre country park at Great Kneighton, however, three miles south of Cambridge city centre near Trumpington and the M11 to London. Developers Countryside have planted more than 14,000 trees in the park and Hobson’s Brook, which runs through it, is perfect for Pooh sticks.
There may not be any Tiggers or Kangas in the neighbourhood but otters have been spotted playing in the brook and nearby are four ponds that are part of a bird reserve – home to lapwings, corn buntings and little ringed plovers.
“Providing natural green spaces, both for residents and wildlife, is very much our ethos at Countryside,” says Andrew Carrington, the company’s managing director of strategic land. “We have a number of ecological projects on all of our sites to attract and enhance the wildlife and make sure they thrive for many years to come.” Several developers are involved in building homes at Great Kneighton, which also includes allotments and sports pitches and will have a new primary school and secondary school. A bus route and cycle path goes through the development straight to Cambridge railway station and trains to Peterborough and London King’s Cross. Currently available from Countryside is Aura, a collection of two and threebedroom apartments and three, four and fivebedroom houses, with prices starting from £674,995 (01223 850915; auracambridge.co.uk). You won’t find a house at Pooh Corner in Coppice End or Great Kneighton but with countryside and woods on the doorstep they are just the place for a thrilling adventure.