We moved down from Winchester to take over Aquila Heights last April, and have now been running the guest house for a year. This is a great time to reflect back on our first twelve months in this completely new lifestyle.
Aquila Heights Guests are Lovely
Without any doubt, our guests have been the highlight of running our business so far. The people who visit Dorchester and stay at Aquila Heights are wonderful, almost without exception - it’s a very real pleasure to look after them. We’ve been surprised that we really do miss them when they go home, and we genuinely look forward to when our many regular guests return and we see familiar names in the booking diary. Every week, new guests arrive at Aquila Heights, and at the end of their visits we wave goodbye to a new set of friends.
Dorchester is a Great Place to Live, Work and Visit
We have said this before, and have certainly not changed our minds! Dorchester is a small, gentle market town, but comes with all the facilities and amenities of somewhere much bigger due to its County Town status. It’s a really attractive place, especially when the tree-lined walks are in leaf, and it is, of course, almost completely surrounded by gorgeous rolling countryside with jaw-dropping panoramics in all directions. And one of the most wonderful stretches of coastline in the country – perhaps in the World – is just over the Ridgeway, with easy access to countless iconic Jurassic Coast landmarks.
Dorset People & Businesses are Special
Now that we’ve been here a year and are starting to properly settle down, we’ve started meeting many more local people and businesses, and absolutely everyone we’ve met has been welcoming, helpful and very friendly. With the help of many local businesses, we’ve replaced part of the roof, installed a gorgeous bathroom, rebuilt our website, remarketed our rooms with some gorgeous photos, installed a lovely new hanging sign, increased our range of local food, and begun building partnerships with other local tourist businesses.
We are Enjoying Personalising Aquila Heights
For the first few months, all of our time and thinking was focussed on learning our new business and just running the guest house successfully from day to day. However, in the last six months we’ve been able to start planning the future. We’ve rebranded the business with a new logo, and revamped the website to better reflect our own personalities. We’ve also started to refurbish the guest house more in our own style, but retaining that relaxing comfortable ambience we know our guests love so much. We’ve started with the two big superior bedrooms, Room 3 and Room 5, and have been really pleased with the feedback from guests. We are currently planning to completely refurbish the breakfast room over the summer, and then next winter we’ll tackle the four remaining bedrooms.
Do let us know what you think when you visit us – we are always looking for feedback so that we can keep Aquila Heights special for all of our guests, as well as for ourselves.