We fancied that we’d prepare and post a blog update onto the website in time for Easter – ever the optimists!

Being busy is a wonderful problem to have and we’re delighted that, since opening, The Waiting Room Pool has been very busy, especially at weekends.

To accommodate everyone over the Easter period we opened early at 8:00am and, on occasion, closed as late as 22:30 – we’re reliably informed by parents that an evening swim was loved by children who’d normally not be allowed such a treat on school night! 

We clean the pool facilities in-between every hire and also manage our two holiday cabins The Signal Box and The Sidings – so we’re never short of something to do and usually kept busy.

You never really know how much interest you’re going to attract or indeed if there will be an ongoing demand for your facilities? Opening The Waiting Room Pool and investing our time and money into this project was always going to be a risk and we’re delighted with the way things are progessing so far.  Being a new business, we realised that things might take time to fall into place but, thanks the tremendous power and influence of social media and in turn word of mouth it seems that the word is well and truly out and we’re relieved to have hit the ground running.

We have been very busy, although since the Easter holiday’s, thankfully, it’s not quite so demanding.  We are delighted to be welcoming pool hirers from Liskeard, St Austell, Plymouth, Launceston, Tavistock, Saltash, Okehampton and even Luckett! It’s fast becoming the local facility we really hoped it would be with several hirers committing to weekly repeat bookings.

It’s been a wonderful experience for us seeing the Old Station returning to a life of service with so many, children in particular, arriving and spilling excitedly out of cars eager to use the facilities.

Many hirers, for a variety of different reasons, tell us that feel more comfortable using private facilities for swimming and leisure and we really understand that.  We are also getting great feedback on our decision to opt for a warm pool and warm building, it’s a definitie winner! One lovely lady even telling me it’s her therapy pool.

The cheerful noise of friends and families bustling along the platform and the happy sound of laughter and life fills the air and it feels ‘just right’ – the station was built to be useful and have purpose and now it very much has!

Plymouth Live contacted us for an interview just before Easter when they saw posts advertising our facilities on social media and, as a result, last weekend they ran our story – which had a few inaccuracies to begin with, including stating that we were located in Devon – which seemed to cause a bit of a stir on social media! Thankfully, the errors were corrected quickly – again thanks to the power, speed and adaptability of online media.

For us it is rewarding to see the Old Station and The Waiting Room Pool on The Plymouth Live and the Devon Live sites, with their following of over 160k we’re grateful to receive this huge coverage – lucky us!

When we bought Old Luckett Station back in 2017, we knew that our role here would be as custodians of the Old Station and from the outset we also knew that it was our duty to make the Old Station, it’s outbuildings and grounds serve a useful purpose for both it’s continued upkeep and for the local and wider communities benefit, we believe we have struck the right balance in the choices we have made so far.

There are two unique holiday cabins here in the station grounds and both enjoy year round occupancy and, although not always popular with everyone, we believe we’ve chosen the right platform to advertise and manage our properties in Airbnb.
We believe it’s important that the Tamar Valley has a presence on this platform and want to promote low impact tourism to local visitors and from all across the world, we believe we are well placed to showcase this amazing area of Cornwall and Devon and do our best to be good ambassadors.

Until the pandemic hit, we benefitted from a healthy mix of guests booking our accommodation from all across the world, most notably America, Australia, Canada and Europe.

Following the pandemic, it may surprise readers to learn that 50% of our bookings is now from the West Country, most often from Plymouth, Saltash and Exeter and we now rarely receive any visitors from anywhere else other than the UK.

We proudly champion our local and wider communities promoting restaurants, shops and services with confidence – we are very lucky to have the best of all good things on our doorstep.

The Old Station was originally built to serve the local community and provide a link to transport goods and visitors to another destination. Romantically, we would like to believe that the Old Station still holds a special magic and retains the power to transport all visitors to a happier place during the time they spend here… 

What’s next?

A new website is planned. With help, we have been managing our own website these past few months and, although it’s been a steep learning curve, it’s invaluable to have control over content.
The next step for us is a website redesign, we have found a local gem who will both work with us to transform the site and also teach us how to look after it too. Watch this space!

We’re very much looking forward to watching and celebrating the King’s Coronation in May, it feels appropriate for the country to be heading into the Carolean era and we’re personally looking forward to taking an afternoon and evening off to celebrate and raise a glass (or two) with friends and neighbours in the village.

We love decorating the Old Station for special occasions and we have a coronation flag in waiting to go up on the railway bridge and of course, plenty of bunting – let’s just hope the sun shines on us all on that special weekend!

Feedback is always welcomed, if you have stayed in The Signal Box or The Sidings or hired The Waiting Room Pool and you have an opinion on anything that you would like to share, please email us on: oldluckettstation@hotmail.com and let us know your thoughts

We remain in a constant state of improvement and learning and we can only get things right by listening to advice and feedback.