Manor house with train platform for sale for £795k: 16th-century home comes with private use of the Campbell's Platform request stop

For the price of a Walthamstow terrace house, this six-bedroom mansion makes commuting a breeze — just stick out your arm and the train will stop for you...
Becky Davies12 March 2020

London commuters weary of being jostled by fellow passengers as they await their train can swap their three-bed terrace house in Walthamstow for a manor house with its very own private railway platform.

Plas y Dduallt, on the market for £795,000, sits on the Ffestiniog Railway route, which was built in 1836 to carry slate the 13-mile journey from Blaenau Ffestiniog to Porthmadog for export by sea.

The private platform, complete with signal box, was built in 1965 by the then owner of the house, Colonel Andrew Campbell, who even kept his own locomotive in a siding and ran his own train to and from Tan-y-Bwlch, six miles down the track.

He would leave his car at Tan-y-Bwlch station, drive his locomotive up the line and park in the siding before sending his shopping down to the house on an aerial hoist.

Inside the 16th century Welsh manor house with private train platform

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Fittingly, the stop is called Campbell's Platform and is strictly for the use of residents and visitors of the house. Officially, passengers should check with the Ffestiniog Railway Company, the oldest railway company in the world, that the train will stop at the station, but it is a request stop, so if you stick out your arm in time, the engine driver will see you and stop the train to let you board.

The timetable varies by season, but in August there are eight trains each way.

A LIVING HISTORY LESSON

There are plenty of historic touches in the Grade II-listed 16th century manor house whose name means "the house on the black hillside". One of the three bedrooms on the first floor is known as Cromwell's bedroom — Oliver Cromwell is reputed to have stayed at the house while plotting the siege of Harlech during the English Civil War.

Historic home: views, exposed stone and a minstrels' gallery in the kitchen add character to the remote Snowdonia house

Exposed stone walls feature in most rooms with stone flagged floors and there is even a minstrels' gallery overlooking the kitchen.

The 20ft sitting room has a large leaded window with views across the valley to Rhinogs and includes a slate flagged balcony with steps winding down a tower to the front lawn.

The ground floor also includes a dining room, kitchen, a separate kitchen-diner, two bathrooms and two bedrooms. There is an attic bedroom on the top floor, and a cellar three floors below.

A spiral staircase from the living room leads to the 20ft triple-aspect master bedroom, complete with fireplace.

LIVE IN A WELSH NATIONAL PARK

The house is set in five acres of grounds in the heart of Snowdonia, three of which are on a 50-year lease from the National Trust.

A lawned cottage-style garden featuring five cascading ponds fed by a mountain stream, is included in the freehold land, while there is also a kitchen garden laid to herbs as well as a vegetable garden.

Large gardens: the house is set on five acres of grounds

Should you not wish to rely on the admittedly seasonal Ffestiniog Railway, it takes just over four hours to Euston from Blaenau Ffestiniog station via Llandudno and Chester.

Plas y Dduallt is on the market for offers in the region of £795,000 through Walter Lloyd Jones