The Shenandoah Basset Dacha

Experience the magic of another era in this big, comfortable Victorian house in the heart of the Shenandoah Valley, on a quiet, tree-lined street in Strasburg’s historic district. The neighborhood is wreathed in meadows and dotted with old churches, with views of Massanutten Mountain and the Alleghenies in the distance. Built in 1868 as a Lutheran parsonage, the house is like a folk art museum inside, with rich colors and paintings on the walls –an unforgettable backdrop for making memories. There are 5 bedrooms, 3 full bathrooms, a dining room, a parlor, a living room, a sun room/former art studio, and a fully-equipped kitchen. There are also two porches, one in front, with a bench swing and cushioned seating; the other, screened-in, in back, for summer meals. There’s a brick patio right off the back porch, adjoining a fully-fenced, spacious yard. The house is a fifteen-minute walk from the Shenandoah River, and a two-block walk from Strasburg's quaint main street (King Street), where you will find boutiques, antique shops, restaurants, and the town green—where they give free concerts in summer. There’s a beautiful public pool in the town park, a mile away, overlooked by Massanutten Mountain. The park has a playground for little kids, a boat slip to the Shenandoah, basketball and tennis courts, gazebos for picnicking, and fields for soccer. From Strasburg, it’s a ten- or fifteen-minute drive to the Shenandoah National Park entrance in Front Royal; to the Belle Grove and Cedar Creek historic site in Middletown; and to the Valley's many other attractions--battlefields, vineyards, taprooms, gastropubs, hiking paths, parks, gardens, museums and scenic bridges.

The house is characterful, colorful and cozy, with loads of family space both indoors and outside. The ground floor has a parlor, a TV/family room, a dining room, a full bathroom, a sun room/former art studio (one of the owners was an artist, specializing in basset hounds), and a fully equipped kitchen with an Aga gas stove and a built-in breakfast nook. In the breezeway between the kitchen and the back porch there’s a laundry room and a Summer Kitchen with an electric stove. On the brick patio beside the porch, there’s a grill for summer barbecuing. The back garden is sprawling, English-style, with lots of shade trees, and extends to a front lawn that’s also fenced in. There are dog doors throughout the main floor; the flaps can be removed so dogs can get easily to the garden (first make sure all the gates in the picket fence are closed!).

Every room has a different color, theme and use, and you’ll see oil paintings on the walls of basset hounds and of Russian scenes— the owners were professors of Russian and Soviet literature and culture (as well as dog lovers). There are four bedrooms on the second floor. The master has a queen bed and a private full bathroom; the blue bedroom has a full bed, the green bedroom has bunk beds, and the red bedroom has two twins. There’s a second full bathroom in the second-floor hall. There’s a fifth bedroom in the attic, which has its own AC and heating and a double bed.

Other points of interest:

•There’s a carport for PARKING, and you can also park in front of the house.

•There’s a wood-burning stove in the Green Parlor (TV room) , and firewood for your use on the front porch. (Don't make fires in the Yellow Parlor fireplace, the chimney is 200 years old—too fragile.)

• Feel free to use the china, silver, glassware, cooking equipment and table linens in the cabinets and bureaus during your stay for your feasts with family and friends.

• One caution: a calico cat lives here sometimes. Every trace of her existence cannot be wholly eradicated through vacuuming. So if you have severe cat allergies, this may not be the house for you.

I will be happy to tell you anything else you would like to know about the Shenandoah Basset Dacha if you make an inquiry. Email me!

Guest access
You can go anywhere you like in the house, but if you stay in the attic bedroom, turn on the light in the stairwell (right inside the latched door to the attic, on your left on the wall) before you go up, and watch your step! Please do not go into the cellar. But the fuse box is in there; the Property Manager can come over and flip switches if need be. Just in case: the switch to the overhead light in the cellar is on the low ceiling as you enter, directly above your head, right next to the door frame.


Other things to note
ENJOY your time in this house, and do things people did when life was unplugged! Cook, feast, play games (there’s a huge games cupboard in the TV room), paint, read, write, build a fire in the wood-burning stove, or take walks in the neighborhood and its meadows. The house has WIFI, so you can also work on your laptop, watch movies or news (the house subscribes to Sling) and there are three TVs, where you can access your streaming services.

I will email you the full house guide the week before you arrive. Please email me if you have any questions about the house once you are here. To see guest reviews, go to the other major short-term rental site—I am a VRBO novice!