Two cats, one of whom hides from everyone. Carys sat on the kitchen floor on day one and by day three he was on her lap in the photo. Two weeks away and we came home to clean trays, a tidy pile of post and a note that made us laugh.
Reviews
What Penarth says.
Six reviews, one for each kind of visit, including the four-star one about Christmas week. The full set is on the review platforms we are listed on, and every one is from a home we have actually had a key to.
Collected by a third-party review platform. Names shortened at the reviewers' request.
Fourteen-year-old springer, back legs going, on four tablets. Mark did the hour visit every day for ten days with a sling for the garden steps, and the note recorded every dose. He rang us once because she had not eaten, which is exactly what we wanted.
Three rabbits and six chickens for a week in August. Elin found flystrike starting on one of the rabbits on day two, caught it early, took him to the vet and sent us the photos and the bill. He is fine. I do not want to think about the alternative.
Overnights for our anxious labrador were excellent and he clearly adored Mark. Four stars because we could not get Christmas week, which they had told us would happen if we did not book by November. We did not book by November.
Diabetic cat on twice-daily insulin. Carys did the dose with me at the first visit, photographed the pen and the chart, and gave it at exactly our times for nine days. Photo of her eating every morning before the injection. Completely trusted.
Had a burst pipe while we were in Spain. Mark found it on the morning visit, photographed it, rang us, turned the water off at the stopcock we had shown him and let the plumber in. The cats were fine and so was the floor, just about. Worth every penny.
About the four stars
Tom is right. Christmas week was full by November, and we said it would be.
Three sitters can sleep in three houses a night, and from the twentieth of December to the second of January every one of those nights is booked by the end of November, usually by the people who had it the year before. We will not take a fourth house and send a sitter we have not trained, and we will not do an overnight in two houses in one night. So the answer is the one Tom got: book by November, and if you boarded with us last Christmas we ring you in October before the list opens.
Join the list.
Book a first visit, go away for a week, and tell the next owner what it was like. Good or bad, it stays up.