We’ve covered many curiosities around Teignbridge from cat cafes to charity-run rehearsal spaces, and one curiosity worth keeping an eye on is the Dartmoor Reach Alpaca & Glamping Farm.
Run by husband-and-wife duo, Josh Hyson and Natalie Hyson, Dartmoor Reach offers people the chance to relax in nature and in style with sustainable glamping huts, including a converted double-decker bus. It also doubles as a mindfulness retreat as Natalie hosts yoga, meditation and reiki workshops in her studio on the land. All of it is within reach of the fluffy alpacas who come to nose around the farm.
Since opening the farm for business, they have enjoyed such accolades as the Eco Friendly Business of the Year award from the 2023 Devon Women in Business Awards, and have also appeared on Channel 4’s Four in a Bed. They share their story of how the farm started and the work they do to maintain it and grow its presence.
How did the business start?
Josh: We both shared a vision opening a glamping site. We wanted to live on the land here, but if you want to live in the countryside, you need to prove to Teignbridge District Council that you can actually make a living from an agricultural rural business here.
Natalie: That’s when we started growing the farm. Josh converted a chicken house into our first glamping cabin called The Hen House, and carried on building the next two cabins and yoga studio while lockdown was still going on.
Josh: We built the business around the alpacas because everyone loves alpacas, but when we started breeding them, we realised we needed to be on the land to look after them well. However, alpacas are what draw in the guests, especially for the glamping, since they’re a majestic, calm animal that people can’t help but smile at when they see them.
Natalie: It’s a big novelty for the people who come here to practise yoga. They look out onto our beautiful field, which generally makes people feel better, and love it when they see the alpacas who come right up to the studio and nose into the class.
What is business like for Dartmoor Reach?
Josh: Foreigners make up almost 50% of our glamping clientele; the furthest distance someone had travelled was a guy from Peru. On the flipside, we have people as close as Kingsteignton that come.
Natalie: People from Plymouth or Torquay that want a little weekend away but don’t want to spend five hours on the motorway will come as well, so there’s quite a mixture.
People tend to come locally from Totnes and Torquay for the events and the yoga studio. A lot of people found me through my online classes, especially during lockdown, but there was also one lady as far as Buckinghamshire who attended my yoga classes online for four years and came down to stay in the retreat this year!
How do you try and spread the word about Dartmoor Reach?
Josh: We do all the usual social media stuff and try to network as much as possible. We do a bit of guerilla advertising with banners in Kingsteignton, Natalie puts out flyers for her yoga classes, which she gets an awful lot of business from, and has been on BBC Radio Devon a few times.
It’s taken a good few years to build that word of mouth; even people from the village closest in Hennock come to Natalie’s classes and say they never realised we’re here. So we take every opportunity we can get for a bit of exposure.
How have you shown commitment towards being an eco-friendly retreat?
Natalie: We try not to throw anything away if we can. All the compost from the compostable toilets goes in a mulcher and get spread around the trees. We have our own water supply. We grow our own food and vegetables. Straw bales are in the house now.
Josh: Everything that turned our chicken house into our first glamping cabin that accommodates a family of four was all upcycled. Because of lockdown, everything was closed, so we couldn’t buy anything new, but it also worked for our ethos of not using single-use plastics on the glamping side.
We raise our own meat. We make our own honey with our bees and brew our own beer. Our double-decker bus would’ve ended up on the scrap heap, but we turned it into something that’s generating an income for us, so it’s all a very low carbon footprint setup we’ve got here.
What difficulties have you faced maintaining Dartmoor Reach?
Josh: It’s not for everyone. A lot of people have this romantic image of what it’s like to run a farm, but they would get a shock as to how much work’s involved, how hard the winters are, and how hard it is to make money from it, as every farmer will tell you. We can easily do 12-hour days, 6 days a week covering the work of 3 people, so that’s probably the biggest difficulty. On the flipside, it’s a lifestyle business, and I’d rather be working those hours on the farm than in an office!
Natalie: On the outside, the huts all look quaint and cosy, but there’s so much of the infrastructure Josh has to build for it such as getting the water and electric to the huts and getting the drainage away from the huts.
Although we might work long hours, a very small percentage of it is something we actually don’t want to do, except maybe emptying the compost toilets, but like Josh says, it’s a lifestyle choice. The commute to work is literally outside the front door.
What have you got lined up for the future?
Josh: We’re aiming to put on a variety of retreats next year, all focused on improving people’s mental health by getting them back into nature. We’re concentrating more on the alpaca experiences, like lunch with the alpacas where guests will be able to come and have home-reared pork, sausage, hot dogs and potato wedges overlooking the alpaca field.
We’re also concentrating on courses and workshops teaching people who feel brave enough to do what we’ve done here: how to source the land, how to put a business plan together, how to get the planning permission, right down to how to build the house, which you can find on our website under Reach for your Dream.
We’ve also applied to the Green Business Grant from Teignbridge District Council, so we’re having solar panels installed in the new year.
Do you have any advice for people wanting to start a glamping site?
Josh: Do some research, get some knowledge, and go for it. It’s a big leap and not for the faint hearted, but as we can prove, it’s possible to do it. As much as it is hard work, you’re outside and you’re being active a lot which is great for your physical and mental health.
Natalie: You probably need a bit of patience as well. Dartmoor Reach wasn’t what it is today when we started; it took a bit of time and lots of commitment. You’ve got to really want to do it. I wouldn’t have it any other way.