If you go walking in Wensleydale: if you go for a walk from Jervaulx to Jervaulx via Thornton Steward, you’ll come across this tree home, at the edge of a field, commanding views over the valley. It has just one door and, importantly for Monday Window, just one window.
It’s pretty much in the middle of nowhere, but I always like to imagine a doting grandfather, tall and rangy from a tough life’s farming and probably reminiscent of the BFG, lovingly creating a little refuge for his grandchild in this hollow tree.
A first glimpse ….
… a second glimpse …
… and the whole thing.
I couldn’t fit in it, neither could you. Perhaps the grandchild is too big now. But I know a couple of young people who’d love to play there. Perhaps you do too.
From Pyrenees to Pennines 
Gorgeous, lucky the child it was made for.
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Indeed – what adventures!
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How fabulous is that! I would have loved it as a child!
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Me, I’d love it now too!
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Cool location, I always admire very old oak trees 🙂
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How delightful!
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It was an unexpected treat to see it on our walk.
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We’re very lucky. We have a great many round here.
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I feel Quentin Blake sitting with his sketch pad must be just out of the frame!
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D’you know, you might just be right!
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Oo, I do like that!
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I thought you would. It appeals to those of us with a highly developed Inner Child, non?
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I had an old trap (as in pony and trap), with the wheels taken off, as a den. It was super! I also had my own personal rowan tree that was perfect for climbing and I could watch the world go by, but no-one could see me. Inner Child? What on earth do you mean?
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Lovely to see the tree house. I have seen doors in trees but nothing that had the character of this one.
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It’s a treasure, isn’t it? I wonder how much it was used? It’s really some distance from the nearest building.
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… and if it was only humans who used it?
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Oooh, fair point.
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Delightful1! That is a magnificent tree. Wonderful photos. Thank you!
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It’s a great tree, isn’t it? Even without its little house.
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Indeed. I love that last photo of yours, it shows the magnificence of that gnarly tree so beautifully!
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It’s fun, isn’t it?
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What a snug little hobbit home! I can only imagine a reclusive writer lives there.
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A reclusive pre-school writer? Excellent! 😉
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That’s really quirky! Hope no damage done to the tree though.
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No, I can confirm it was already hollow, and the BFG obviously loved and cared about his tree.
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😂
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I certainly do. What a fabulous thing. I bet it has so many stories to share too 😊
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Were you able to peek inside? For some reason it makes me thinks of the Milly Molly Mandy book I inherited from my mother, as they had a tree house up in the boughs of an oak.
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Somehow, I never read Milly Molly Mandy. My loss. You can just about see inside, and I can confirm there are no fixtures and fittings 😉
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For me, the chapter including Milly Molly Mandy was a standout in Lucy Mangan’s Bookworm. How lovely to have one of the older copies of the book, Carol!
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I can’t imagine how I missed out on MMM. I love Lucy Mangan’s book. I’m convinced she wrote it for me.
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🙂
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Great find.
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It made our walk!
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Wonderful find!
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Serendipity rules.
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Jervaulx sounds very French, doesn’t it? Any ideas? I wonder if many moons ago religious monks were in the area and left the name? I love quirky things like this.
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That’s because it is. Jervaulx, Rievaulx, Fountains etc. were all Cistercian abbeys. Their founder was Bernard of Clairvaux, and active links were maintained with France throughout the mediaeval period.
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Thanks…I was also thinking of Rievaulx.
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Reminiscent of wardrobes and holes near trees …
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🙂
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You recommended this walk to us in our Yorkshire holiday and I too have a photograph of this bijou home
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Well, it’s still there. It seems pretty solid still.
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Wonderful! I’d love it now, even if only to admire from outside.
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You could have a field day, Debbie, getting interesting shots.
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This is how I imagine the fields in England to be like. I can blame A. A. Milne for that. I can imagine Christopher Robin and Pooh Bear living there.
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Oh, completely. This is picture postcard England at its finest.
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I didn’t think it would be true that these existed in real life.
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Oh yes – despite everything there’s still space for the bucolic.
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Indeed. It is a must.
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I loved my fairy houses as a child – I had a whole village in the middle of some conifers. If only though i had this!
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Wouldn’t we all have loved this. Yes, I had a Wild Wood too. It might have been as many as six trees out at the edge of the village.
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Guess we were lucky as kids as we had time and space to enjoy our imagination, and not too many distractions
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