Our stay at the Vicarage guest house made our trip to St Ives a real treat. The beautiful Victorian house was immaculate, welcoming, homely, and our family room was very clean. The house really looked like a labour of love as the owners we met, Dianne and Martin had attended to every detail without it feeling contrived. Dianne's love of art was evident to see as she displayed an interesting collection throughout the house including her own. We also enjoyed the garden (I played Badminton for the first time in years, and crazy golf for the first time!).

The breakfasts were lovely, sourced locally and cooked to perfection. It's clear to see why they have won awards for their breakfasts. Being in Cornwall, all I was interested in was the fish, so most mornings I had fresh kippers and scrambled eggs, mmmm! No boil in the bag here! My husband had the haddock and poached eggs and was raving that they were the best poached eggs he'd ever had and the haddock was large and flavoursome, he also said that the full English was really nice too. We were all so full up and satisfied with this high quality fayre that we didn't feel hungry for a full meal until about 4pm, only snacks sufficed.

Dianne and Martin's presence was very low key which made you as the guest feel that you had the run of the house, but they were on hand if you needed them. One thing that struck us about this place was how trusting they were of their guests. There was a self-service bar called the 'honesty bar' which meant whatever you took, you wrote down on a pad and paid before you left. Not sure how many establishments this would work in, but it certainly worked here, as they obviously attract a certain type of guest, and it complemented the homely atmosphere.
The remainder of this review will concentrate on the real gem of the outfit though, Penny, who played numerous roles of the housekeeper, maid and waitress (sorry Penny I forgot your job title). She seemed to love her job and attended to us like we were staying in her own home. From the moment we arrived she showed us around and told us to make use of the house as if it were ours, and we did, as our family room was a bit small for all four of us to stay in all the time with the unpredictable weather, so the lounge was a perfect escape, with it's great choice of books, DVDs and art for us to admire. This worked out especially well in the mornings after breakfast , as we left out a little later than we would usually, due to the weather. Penny really took to our two girls of 9 and 7 (as they did to her!) and nothing was too much trouble. She took a lot of pride in her work and went over our room every morning which I'm not used to in a guest house.
All in all, a great place, will definitely stay at the Old Vicarage if we go back to St Ives, especially if Penny's still working there!