Fortescue Lodge, Bournemouth

Fortescue Lodge is a self-contained one-bedroom lodge at the bottom of the owners' garden on a quiet Bournemouth residential street, fenced off with its own access and its own enclosed garden. For dog owners that enclosure is the headline: it is the feature guests travelling with dogs mention above everything else, and it means a dog can be let out without a lead, a corridor or another guest in the way.

Pets are allowed for an additional £20. No maximum number is published, so message the hosts if you are bringing more than one, though guests have stayed with a pair of small dogs without difficulty. The hosts handle dog-specific requests well and have pointed guests towards nearby restaurants that turned out to welcome dogs onto the furniture rather than just through the door.

The lodge itself is compact and carefully done: good decor, a hot tub with a parasol that screens it from the neighbouring windows, a boiling tap, and a kitchenette built round a portable electric stove rather than a full cooker. Parking is right outside the door, which is a genuine convenience after a muddy walk. The beach is around ten minutes by car, restaurants roughly ten minutes on foot, and Durdle Door a forty-minute drive for a bigger day out.

Three caveats are worth carrying into the booking. Cleanliness is the recurring complaint: dust left behind the television, crockery needing a rewash, no toilet roll or hand soap on arrival, and debris found down the side of the sofa. Second, the hosts are usually quick to reply, sometimes within minutes, but guests have also waited most of a day for an answer when the hot tap and the television stopped working mid-stay. Third, this is a lodge in a back garden rather than a detached cabin in woodland, and guests who pictured the latter have been disappointed by the setting even when the unit itself was private. The bedroom has no window, so it can feel stuffy in warm weather, and the bed is comfortable but noisy when anyone turns over.

Best suited to a couple with one or two small or medium dogs wanting a short private-garden break near Bournemouth beach, who would rather have a hot tub and an enclosed lawn than floor space. Less of a fit for longer stays, larger dogs needing indoor room, or anyone expecting a remote holiday cabin.