What's better than staying in the most sought-after Airbnb? Buying it
This metal box looking over the Sound of Mull is a very special — and hugely popular — Highland escape.
Here at Country Life we don't write about all properties, but we do write about a pretty wide variety. Sometimes it's a sprawling estate, sometimes it's a Victorian glasshouse, and sometimes it's a medieval relic with a hot tub.
Once in a while, though, we cover country homes that can best be described as metal boxes. It doesn't happen much, but it does happen — and today is one of those days, as we take a look at Druim Na Cracaig, a magnificently bonkers property that's in one of the most remote places in the UK mainland. It's for sale through Savills at £750,000.
If, for some reason, the pictures on this page won't load for you, it's a dinky little home that looks like a cross between a submarine, a UFO and an Airstream caravan, all situated in as wonderful a Scottish country setting as you could imagine. It's on an unspoilt hillside that overlooks the Sound of Mull, where the only thing that can interrupt your Highland idyll is the view of the ferries plying their way from Oban to the Outer Hebrides.
It's about as far from the typical Scottish manse as you could imagine, yet it's become something of a smash on the holiday rental market, with the agents describing it as 'one of the most sought-after and wish-listed Airbnb properties in the United Kingdom.' It's not a place you would — or perhaps even could — live permanently, but for a few days getting away from it all, it's hard to imagine somewhere that offers a better blend of whimsy and natural beauty.
All that success prompted the owners of this wacky little home to build two more similar places, both of which are included in the listing. The original home has been dubbed 'Airship 002' (despite there only being one of them, so far as we can see), with the other two buildings called 'The Captain's Cabin' and 'The PilotHouse'. No, that's not a typo: PilotHouse is presented as a single word with a capital H in the middle. If I could figure out how to type a 'shrug' emoji, I would have added one here.
Dubious grammar aside, the other two places to stay here, while not as eyecatching as the original Airship 002, are just as fun, and better suited to larger groups. The PilotHouse looks like a corrugated metal pencil sharpener, while The Captain's Cabin looks to our eyes as if an ancient croft building — it's actually an chapel where the owners live at the moment — decided to wear a giant metal top hat.
They're being sold as a trio, and with a suggestion that they'd attract holiday rental income of around £100,000 a year. Clearly keeping all that metal polished and shiny would cost a fair bit, but it still seems like there's a decent business to be run here. A very decent business.
'Together, the properties represent an exceptional lifestyle and business opportunity, combining award-worthy design, established trading success and an unforgettable setting on Scotland's west coast,' say Savills. 'The sale offers the rare chance to acquire one of the country's most distinctive hospitality enterprises, with a proven reputation and significant ongoing appeal to domestic and international visitors alike.'
Obviously, you could ignore the letting possibilities completely, and live in these wacky little homes yourself. But for those looking to run this unusual trio of places while living nearby, the owners are also selling a pair of more traditional Highland homes, the four-bedroom Tigh Darach, at £525,000, and the three-bedroom Tigh Na Mara, at £425,000.
