Deep in the Deux-Sèvres countryside, surrounded by fields, trees and hardly a neighbour in sight, Zak and Sarah Pugh have found a little piece of heaven.
Their farm, Saumort, is the only remaining property of an old village which bore the same name. But although the village may have gone, its spirit lives on in the stone and timber of the long-demolished château – used to build part of the house and the gîte on the site.
The 12-hectare property, which nestles in the Gatine countryside next to the peaceful River Saumort, a short drive from La Chapelle Thireuil, is now home to Zak, 34, Sarah, 35, and their two children – three-year-old Josh and 15-month-old Harry who were both born in France since the couple’s arrival in December 2002.
It’s been a whirlwind four and a half years which has seen wonderful highs – the joy of the arrival of their two boys – and a very stressful low during Sarah’s (successful) treatment for thyroid cancer; but after all this they have no regrets and both agree that their lives have been changed completely for the better by their decision to venture across the Channel to set up a gîte/equestrian business.
‘We love it here,’ says Sarah. ‘Zak hasn’t been back [to the UK] since we came here and I’ve only been back once. Now people come to us. I think we see more of our family now than we did before.’
Their decision to come to France was born out of a strong desire to swap their hectic stressful, deadline-focused lives for a slower, more tranquil way of life where they could have a family and both be around to see their children grow up.
‘So many people work such long hours to pay their mortgages that they hardly see their family. I didn’t want that,’ Zak told me. ‘I always said to myself that by the time I was 30 I wouldn’t be in the rat race.’
So with that in mind Zak persuaded Sarah to put her career as a riding instructor temporarily on the back burner and join him in the more lucrative business of computer programming to get some money behind them.
They worked hard and in 2000 they bought an equestrian centre in the Vale of York with plans to run equestrian and computer businesses from home. But they had a big mortgage to pay and quickly realised that rather than the dream life they had hoped for, what stretched ahead was years of hard work to pay off their loan.
It was time for drastic action. Zak had always loved France having holidayed there regularly as a child but for Sarah – apart from a couple of skiing trips – it was uncharted territory. It wasn’t until Sarah’s mum began planning a move to Charente that the couple saw that a move to France could be the solution to their dilemma.
If they moved to France they could buy a property with land for a fraction of what something similar would cost in the UK and live mortgage free while running a small business from home. They would have time for each other and time for their children. Perfect. And that is just what they have done.
From the moment they’d made their decision, events moved swiftly. They put their UK equestrian centre on the market in October 2002. It had doubled in value and they had three cash buyers who all wanted it. By December the same year, they had sold up, bought Saumort for approximately £160,000 cash and moved in – with £100,000 in their pockets to do the renovations and to live on until the gîte/equestrian business was up and running.
‘We came over for a week to look for somewhere and this was the first place we saw,’ says Zak. ‘Initially, we were a bit worried that we’d taken on too much but now we’re really glad we did because there is room for expansion here and we are definitely in this for the long term.’
From there, their new life slowly evolved. ‘We didn’t do a lot for the first year,’ says Zak. ‘We learned some French, got to know the neighbours . . .’ ‘Had a child,’ chips in Sarah. ‘We didn’t want to rush into things. We wanted to plan things and settle in.’
Then gradually, they began to transform the rather tired farm into the pretty picture of inviting rural tranquility that it is today.
With the help of one of their closest neighbours and now good friend, the mayor’s nephew Damian Fazillaut, Zak transformed a weed-infested patch of grass at the back of the house and gîte into a beautiful terrace area with its own private pool. He has learned French plumbing and electrics and is making sure that all the renovations are done to a high standard.
‘This is absolutely a lifetime’s commitment,’ Zak says. ‘We have no ambition to move on so we are making sure that everything is being done to the right standards.’
They redecorated and furnished the gîte and by June 2004 they were ready for their first guests.
At the same time as the buildings began to take shape, the couple started to breathe new life into the farm too. They have slowly collected a much-loved menagerie that is proving a huge hit with guests. As well as the nine horses, they also have two Kune Kune pigs, three goats, three dogs, two cats and a small flock of ducks, chickens and guinea fowl.
And it is the animals and the couple’s hand-on approach which seems to have been the secret to their success.
‘As soon as Sarah walks out in the mornings she is surrounded by children,’ says Zak. ‘They just love it and she is really good with them. There is so much to do here with the animals. It certainly works for the customers and having happy customers is what makes us happy.
‘Really what we are doing is letting people into our lives to share our enjoyment of this place and it really seems to be working. We are getting a lot of repeat bookings because the children want to come back. Sarah gets lots of letters and emails from children who have been to stay here and we are finding that people are coming back out of season as an extra holiday.’
They are thinking of starting a regular Saumort newsletter to keep guests up to date with all the events on the farm and already have plans to convert one of the outbuildings into a second gîte which will also have a private pool looking out over the River Saumort and the surrounding countryside.
The horses too are a draw for guests and locals alike. Sarah is a British Horse Society instructor with 20 years’ experience and 10,000 hours teaching under her belt. She is currently compiling the complicated dossier required to get her qualifications recognised in France but until this process is completed if she teaches riding in France she must be supervised by a French instructor with only 500-plus hours’ experience.
To get round this problem, the couple hire out the horses to customers under Sarah’s guidance but any benefit they get from Sarah’s expertise is provided free of charge.
‘In one way it’s good because it ensures that only qualified people are teaching riding over here. In the UK anyone could open a riding school and start teaching but here they are much more strict,’ she says. ‘However, it’s quite a job to collect references and proof of all your teaching hours and qualifications. It’s taken me about a year so far but I’m nearly there now.’
As well as riding the horses either in the indoor or outdoor schools, or out in the surrounding countryside, guests can also help to look after them too. ‘They can help catch the horses and groom them, muck them out, feed them and turn them out if they are interested,’ says Sarah. ‘It’s up to them how much or how little they want to get involved.’
Sarah has also seen a niche market for people who want a happy retirement for their much-loved equines. One Jersey-based client who has retired her horse to Saumort has bought a second home in France with the money she has saved on livery fees; her friend thought it was such a good idea that she sent hers too.
‘The climate here is so good for horses, especially the oldies and it costs a lot less to keep them out here,’ says Sarah. ‘We have two here on retirement livery. It’s much better for arthritic limbs and lungs and they live in a herd in a natural environment. We’d like to take more.’
She also cherishes a dream to bring disadvantaged children over to enjoy all that Saumort has to offer. ‘If I won the lottery, that’s what I’d do,’ she says with a smile.
The couple have been warmly welcomed into the local community and now have many friends both English and French. Their language skills have blossomed from hardly any (Zak) and good O’level (Sarah) to approaching fluency and with two pregnancies and a spell of hospital treatment behind her, Sarah is full of praise for the French health system.
In fact it is the warmth of the welcome that they have experienced from everyone in France that they want to extend to their visitors.
‘We just want it to be right,’ they say. ‘We want people to have a nice time.’ And somehow you know that they will.
Sarah and Zak Pugh
www.saumort.com
sarah@saumort.com