You know when you were a kid, and you tried to go through the back of your wardrobe, to Narnia... :) Okay, okay - just me? Well anyway, that's what our trip to Northlands was like! The tropical version of Narnia, that is. And Lisa's place was the cherry on top. The aroha (love) that has been put into every single detail of the cottage, is so inspiring and made us (and evidently many other happy guests) feel so honoured and special. My husband and I got lost along the way to the place, high up in the bush - but that was pretty much our fault and down to the fact that you lose signal along the last part of the drive. So do perhaps consider relying on paper maps (in addition to Google) - for the last leg of the journey. It was weird - maybe no one else has had this problem. As frustrating and exhausting as that was, in a bizarre way, it added to the sense that we had crossed over some invisible veil, to the magical wonderland that the far North of Aotearoa truly is. And, I already live in another exceptionally beautiful place, in New Zealand - so that's saying a lot! I think, if the Vineyard cottage had an (ideally outdoor - to marvel at the INCREDIBLE night sky) bath, and an indoor fireplace, we literally would never have left :) because that would complete the perfection! Ha ha! As it was anyway, we still genuinely struggled hard to leave! Lisa was the sweetest about allowing us to extend our stay, without notice. Lisa also offered us a slightly later check-out, which was very generous, though we couldn't take that up. The space is EXACTLY as shown in the photos. It's like walking into an interiors magazine home. A dreamy space. I found myself going to bed on the first night, literally thinking to myself, 'ah...home sweet home.' Which might sound crazy, but we just felt so comfortable and happy in the space. The views are to die for (this cannot be emphasised enough) and these alone make the property worth every penny, to my mind. Lisa and her wonderful grown up son, found time to provide AMAZING tips and ideas about how to spend our final few days. There are beaches very close by, that make you feel like you're in Hawaii...I mean - not that Hawaii has anything on our magnificent homeland ;) But it felt a million miles away from everything, which was EXACTLY what we wanted and needed. We were blessed with perfect weather right until the last day or so. Do ALL the trips you can, if you are similarly blessed - just to triple down on that, 'died and gone to Heaven' vibe, that is omnipresent anyway. The beach closest to the cottage is covered in oyster shells (this will delight many) so bring some kind of diving shoes if you want to swim from there. On this occassion we didn't kayak but next time, we'll try to. We loved the isolation of that beach, but found it unsuitable for us to swim from. However, there are so many gorgeous beaches in the area, you will be spoilt for choice. Lisa was the perfect hostess for us, maybe it's a Brit thing - but my hubs and I love the 'light touch' of a host who honours our privacy but is there for us, if something crops up! We had some power outages during our stay and each one seemed to fairly swiftly miraculously resolve itself (don't use too many appliances at once). And Lisa and son came swiftly to our aid, in one instance. We utterly fell in love with the cottage, with Northlands and with Lisa and family too. So much so, that we are seriously contemplating moving to the region and Lisa's place may well be our initial base, as (at time of writing) longer stays are possible. It was a huge privilege to stay in this utterly beautiful and cosy home from home, and my husband Mark especially asked me in this review to emphasise how grateful we were to Lisa for her amazing kindness and Mark sends his love. We cannot thank Lisa and family enough, for giving us that opportunity to explore her exquisite estate, and the wider region which is pretty much, my idea of Heaven. It's a long journey for us, but one way or another, we'll be back! :)