WE’RE STI STILL ENJOYING OUR THAI PARADISE
JENNY BROWN, 41, is a creative consultant and lives on the Isle of Wight with her husband, Sam, also 41, a carpenter, and their two sons Rory, nine, and Xavier, five. She says: FLOATING on a lilo in our secluded pool surrounded by lush palms, banana plants and huge jungle-type trees transports me back to tropical holidays in Thailand.
We particularly loved the island of Ko Chang, and its beaches, flanked by lush vegetation, were a real inspiration.
We’re lucky that the area where we live has its own microclimate and rarely suffers frosts.
When we bought our two-bedroom home seven years ago, there was already a figure-of-eight pool here. But it was rundown, with a rusty metal frame, so Sam renovated it.
Together, we came up with a design that would create our own Thai paradise, and spent almost £9,000 doing it up. It is now rectangular and measures 3.5 x 5.5 metres.
The water is extra sparkling thanks to the salt water chlorination system that keeps it clean without any nasty chemicals.
To heat it, we replaced the old solar panels on the roof of our house with new ones.
We use the pool from spring to late October and the boys play in it at every opportunity. It was a godsend during lockdown, and I threw a back-to-school pool party for the boys and a few friends at the start of this month.
Sam loves to have an evening dip to de-stress after work and, although it’s not really big enough to swim lots of lengths, my guilty pleasure is floating on an inflatable with a book when the kids aren’t around. We’d be bonkers to get rid of it.