We Stayed at the Firefly Lane House through Airbnb
What its like to stay at the Firefly Lane House through Airbnb
It was the spring of 2019, before the world fell apart. I was talking to my mother about a summer vacation idea my husband and I had, which included taking the kids to the San Juan Islands off of Seattle and then up to Vancouver. She said that the San Juan Islands had been on her bucket list of trips. And because there are not many places that she hasn’t been over the decades, that she would still like to visit, we jumped on the chance to do a family vacation.
One night while looking on Airbnb, my husband stumbled on the mansion known as the Cotton Cove Estate which is perched on the rocky coast overlooking Horseshoe Bay in Vancouver, Canada. The cost was more than we would pay for a rental (though looking back now it was less expensive than a beach rental in the Outer Banks, NC). My husband jokingly sent it to my mom and she replied “book it”. We thought she was joking in her response and looked for other rentals. By the time we realized she was serious, we had lost out on two of the five days we had planned on renting it. But luckily we did spend three glorious days and nights in the mansion.
When Firefly Lane series showed up in my Netflix account there was a trailer of Katherine Heigle walking down a footpath to the front door of a home. I recognized it immediately…”our” Cotton Cove Estate vacation rental!
The home sits on over one and a half acres of immaculately manicured gardens about 12 miles from the heart of Vancouver. It was build in 1941, apparently in the Tudor Revival style (I looked that up online). There is a master and two bedrooms upstairs, one master on the main floor and a large bedroom in the basement plus 4.5 baths – at least that was what we could all remember.
On various websites they say there are 6 bedrooms, some say 5….we didn’t find the sauna until the day we left so I cannot claim we actually saw the whole house. It is a massive home and yet it feels very cozy, probably because you spend most of your time in the rooms you see in Firefly Lane, the kitchen and the living room/dining room that goes out to the patio.
You enter the home by walking down slate stairs with shrubs and trees encircling you. When you enter the home there is a very wide sprawling staircase. The kitchen is open and leads to the dining room which attaches to another living room with large comfy couches. The whole back of the home is windows looking out to the ocean.
The house had a large basement that we barely ventured into, and a room full of Dom Perignon in boxes just waiting for a party as grand as itself. The grounds were kept by Silver, the caretaker, who lived in the caretakers home that was literally located on the ocean (next to the pool). The garden was an adventure in arches and secret paths. We could leave the house and arrive back on different path, pretty much every day.
Not shown in the series, (at least as of publication of this story), there is a hidden path that leads to a secret children’s garden with a playhouse and a tree swing. The swing was fun and thrilling; you flew out over the hill and high above the water tethered by ropes to a creaking branch.
My parents surprised us by offering my husband and I the master bedroom which had French doors that opened onto the patio that looked out onto the ocean. We fell asleep at night with the doors open listening to the ocean waves and awoke to the ocean breeze in the morning. It really doesn’t get much better than that especially for a girl who grew up far from the ocean.
The master bathroom, with an enormous walk in his and her closet also featured a huge shower and separate tub, that of coarse looked out over the gardens, to the pool and out to the ocean. Really now, from the comfort of your bubble bath, what other view would you want to see from your Airbnb rental?
The pool was probably our favorite feature of the home. It sat on the edge of the property overlooking the ocean. It was a good size pool for swimming and relaxing. The view from every angle was exceptional, one view was of the amazing bay, the other view was of our rental, and another gorgeous home with a glass elevator on the outside and a beautiful beach.
If a dip in the pool wasn’t for you, you could just soak in the Firefly Lane home and sit in awe. Each morning, with a coffee in hand, we would sit on the patio overlooking the garden, pool and bay and watch the sunrise.
Then in the evening we sat with the kids on the patio wall and watched the sun set. The backyard is featured in almost every episode so I’m sure I am not the only one who finds it irresistible.
The home was magical and not surprising it sold in 2020 for just under 22 million dollars (CAD) and is now featured in a Netflix series. In case you don’t watch Firefly Lane, its lead character Kate Mularkey’s (Sarah Chalke) home where she lives with her daughter Marah (Yael Yurman).
Can you find it on Airbnb anymore? Nope, they seem to have taken it down. Maybe after the filming stops for Firefly Lane it will return as a rental. If so, do we recommend it? YES!
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