Cumbria, Yorkshire and Scotland are offering some really beautiful country houses for sale, at a fraction of Home Counties prices

One of the worst summers on record, which caused the cancellation of last week's Great Yorkshire Show for the first time in its 154-year history, has failed to dampen the interest of potential purchasers in one of East Yorkshire's most impressive agricultural and sporting estates.

The recent launch onto the market of the pristine, 782-acre Millington Grange estate, near Pocklington, on the edge of the Yorkshire Wolds (at a guide price of £12 million for the whole), has generated a raft of enquiries from farmers, lifestyle buyers and sporting enthusiasts from Europe and the Middle East, reports Andrew Fallows of Carter Jonas in York (01904 558230). All three groups will find plenty to tempt them at Millington Grange (pictured).

The estate's owner, legendary local entrepreneur John Weatherill, who made his fortune in the telecoms industry before ill-health forced him to sell his business, has used his professional acumen to good effect at his picturesque East Riding estate. At 750ft above sea level, it is one of the highest in the Vale of York, and, on a clear day, you can see Flamborough lighthouse and the boats out at sea from the site.

During his tenure, Mr Weatherill has not only built himself an imposing, 5,000sq ft, neo-Georgian family house and developed two model mixed farming enterprises, High College Farm and Cold Skin Farm, each with its own four-bedroom farmhouse, but has also established a prize-winning herd of Limousin cattle on the estate's free-draining chalk soil, and created a renowned high-bird pheasant shoot within its well-managed woodland and steep dales.

It reputedly took seven years (and five successive planning officers) to obtain the planning consent required to build The Grange, the three-storey Georgian style manor house preferred by the planners to the traditional farmhouse originally proposed by Mr Weatherill. Built between 2004 and 2006, the splendid new country house stands to the north of Millington village, 15 miles from York city centre, and is approached by a floodlit private driveway lined with post and rails.

The ground floor, dominated by a grand marble entrance hall and staircase, has four main reception rooms and a large kitchen/breakfast room with a door leading through to the swimming pool and leisure complex. On the first floor are two luxurious master suites, three further bedrooms with
en-suite bathrooms, and a library, with a further bedroom and two additional rooms on the second floor. To the rear of the house is a traditional courtyard of brick-faced outbuildings with potential for conversion to alternative uses, subject to planning consent.

Description

In all approximately 781.57 acres (316.3 hectares)
For Sale by Private Treaty as a Whole
- The Grange - a large principal house extending to 5,000sq ft, 6 bed.
- High College Farm - comprising a 4 bed farmhouse and well equipped farmstead
- Cold Skin Farm - comprising a 4 bed farmhouse and well equipped farmstead
- Purpose Built Grain Storage for approximately 4,000 tonnes & superb Cattle housing facilities
- 683.25 acres of bare arable land, permanent pasture and Dale
- 98.32 acres of well managed Woodland
- Renowned high bird pheasant shoot
- 2 micro wind turbines generating power for consumption and sale to the grid
- Private borehold water supplies and 3 phase electricity
- Good income streams from HLS and SPS
- Superb location on the edge of the Yorkshire Woods
- Predominantly in a ring fence offering spectacular views