Forget Cotswolds, the Welland Valley is England’s hidden travel gem

A road diversion in 2022 changed Paul McKeown’s life. He was driving home to a town near Leicester, but an accident on the A14 sent him on unfamiliar roads down to Welland Valley. 

“I ended up in a village called Great Easton,” he recalls. “The sun was shining and I got out of the car and walked around. I decided, there and then, I was going to live there.”

Within a year, the former director of an IT firm had moved to this spot on the Leicestershire-Northamptonshire border – a decision he maintains is one of the best he’s ever made. 

“When people think of a traditional English rural scene, they imagine the Cotswolds or Yorkshire Dales or Derbyshire Peaks, but this is more beautiful than any of those,” he says. “I’d never heard of Great Easton or even the Welland Valley, so I was astounded that this had been almost on my doorstep for all those years.”Great Easton is, he says, typical of the villages close to the River Welland – full of old, characterful houses, with a great sense of community and very safe. “I walked into the village pub, The Sun Inn, on that day I first found myself here and immediately felt at ease. It felt like I’d come home. Finding this spot was a complete fluke, but I’ll never move again,” says Paul.

Another couple who ended up here by chance are Gemma and Russell Barder. Gemma had grown up just over the border in Northamptonshire, but “did the usual thing of moving away, living in different cities and vowing never to return to the area I grew up”. Then, a decade ago, she visited her sister in Market Harborough. 

“Jo suggested brunch and I was expecting some little tearoom tacked onto the side of a farm, but she took me to Farndon Fields Farm Shop which was incredible. It was a sign of things to come – the whole area was full of surprises and exceeded our expectations,” says Gemma.“My sister also mentioned some houses for sale in the area and that was that. It was a no-brainer. As well as being close to family, Market Harborough was a gorgeous market town, surrounded by stunning countryside, full of brilliant schools and only an hour from London by train.”

So impressed were the Barders with the area, in fact, that they launched a magazine, MaHa, to celebrate its thriving commercial, cultural and community life. “We are on our seventh year in print, delivering over 3,000 copies – and, best of all, we still haven’t run out of stories to tell about this amazing part of the country,” says Gemma. 

It’s not just those living here who eulogise about this part of the world, either. The judges of The Sunday Times’ Best Places to Live List included Market Harborough in 2025 for the third year running. They pointed to the thriving high street with its selection of upmarket chains and independents, highlighting the pretty Welland Valley countryside and declaring the area was “like the Cotswolds without the price tag or pretentiousness”.The Sunday Times singled out the village of Medbourne as “one of the best addresses in Leicestershire” – and The Nevill Arms in Medbourne is a place where visitors on “scouting missions” ahead of a possible move here often stay. Ellie Uppal, whose family co-owns this boutique country hotel and pub, says the area is still far more affordable than places seen as more ‘fashionable’ such as Suffolk or Cornwall. “You get a lot more bang for your property buck here than you would in those counties.

“I don’t need to sell the area to people, though – you only have to spend an hour here and it sells itself. It’s always had a reputation as being fantastic grazing land so there are still lots of pastures crisscrossed by hedges. The region is full of history and the church architecture is phenomenal – even in small villages you can see epic churches.”

Another new factor putting the area on people’s radar, says Ellie, is The Nevill Holt Festival – a multi-genre cultural event, taking place at Nevill Holt Hall. The brainchild of businessman and philanthropist David Ross, the Festival runs this year from 30 May to 22 June and features everything from opera and comedy to in-conversation events and jazz.According to Ben Cripps, a director of Langton Homes who builds high-end properties in the Welland Valley, Nevill Holt is one of the area’s most charming hamlets – but Medbourne, Great Easton, Hallaton, Horninghold and the set of villages collectively known as ‘the Langtons’ are also among sought-after locations.

“The area is just so amazingly central,” says Ben. “This means it’s great for anyone who needs to travel with work, but it’s also ideal if you have relatives spread far and wide. Whether it’s your kids or your parents, no one is too far away if you live here,” he says. 

It’s also a great place to raise a family and some of the country’s finest schools such as Oakham, Uppingham, Stamford and Oundle are within easy reach.

“A lot of people do work from home, but it’s an easy commute to London. When you step off the train and get back to the Welland Valley, though, it feels like another world,” says Ben. “The term ‘hidden gem’ is overused, but it really is exactly that.”

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