How a stone house keeps warm
Why a wood stove outperforms radiators in a village high on Voras.
The most common worry before a winter booking at 1,100 metres is the cold. It is a fair worry, and the answer is not the radiators.
A stone house has walls with a lot of thermal mass. They are slow to warm, but once warm they hold the temperature for hours after the fire goes out. A radiator heats the air, which is lost the moment a door opens; a wood stove heats the fabric of the house.
At Nest Suite the space is a single room, forty square metres under a honey-pine ceiling, and the wood stove heats all of it. Guests have written to say they never touched the radiators. At Forest House the fireplace holds the living room, and there is heating throughout for the bedrooms.
Practically: light it early in the afternoon rather than when you already feel cold, leave the internal doors open so the warm air circulates, and do not be afraid to let the fire down overnight. Firewood is provided.