One good thing about the lockdown has been that we’ve been able to take some nice, long family walks. Last week, we were told about a nice path just south of us called Hackwood Estate.

As we were warned, on the approach it does not look like a public path. In fact, it looks very imposing and “stay off my land”.

However, there is actually a public footpath that runs through it.

Apparently these “public footpaths” are a time-honored tradition in this country. Many of them go back hundreds, if not thousands, of years and are protected by English Common Law. Basically if a path has been used without obstruction or protest for over 20 years, it can be classified as Public Right of Way, and, near as I can tell, is protected from that point forth.  Some of these pathways wander directly through the middle of fields, or in this case, what was a nobleman’s estate.

As we wandered down the path, we could see what was obviously a magnificent house a ways off the pathway. This is my terrible picture of it.

Not the best view, but you can tell it’s not an ordinary cottage. Upon Googling it, we found out that it’s the manor house for Hackwood Park, the land we were walking on. The estate goes back to 1200, with the house pictured being built in the 1680’s. 24 bedrooms, indoor and outdoor pool, tennis court, the whole nine years. It’s believed to be the most expensive estate ever publicly for sale in this country, with a current asking price of £65 million (about $80 million USD).

Walking further, you can see kept deer roaming the woods outside the house, about 2 dozen of them that we could see.

All only about a 5 minute walk from our house. After a year and a half, this country still manages to surprise us constantly with it’s history and beauty.

If you want to know more about the history of Hackwood, check out the Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackwood_Park

If you’re in the market, well, please invite me to stay after you view the listing here: https://www.christiesrealestate.com/sales/detail/170-l-141-1809180423168654/hackwood-park-eg