Garden hut could be the perfect bolt hole in the Dales

Their amateur build had pride of place in their grandfather's garden in Leeds but the boys, then aged 11 and 16, were keen to make it a real holiday home.

They fancied the Dales, so their father drove John to Appletreewick in the summer of 1935 and told him to find a spot.

"My father sent me to knock on the door of a farmhouse telling me –'it's your hut now you find a home for it'," said John Richardson, now 86.

The farmer showed them an idyllic stretch of pasture by a stream in the nearby hamlet of Howgill and with no planning restrictions and no National Park Authority to cast a beady eye, he told them: "That's where you want to put it. You'll need planning permission. That is no problem, go to Skipton, tell them it is all right by me and they'll be glad of the rates. Rent? How about 4 a year?"

The home-made rural retreat, which took just seven weeks to create, is still sturdy after 75 years and is up for sale for the first time on the open market for 30,000.

It sounds like snip but the idyllic property, hidden deep in the Dales, has no running water, no piped gas or electricity and no drains. But it can sleep eight at a squash and you can wash in the stream while soaking up breathtaking views of Barden fell and Simon's Seat.

The lack of amenities is compensated by its charm and remote location, which makes it the ultimate getaway from the strains of modern life.

The bungalow, which has a living kitchen with sofa bed, bedroom and a passageway featuring bunk beds for four, holds a host of happy memories for John Richardson and his family, who sold it privately to their friends Pam and Roy Atherton in 1986.

Mr Richardson, who owned Richardson's furnishings and giftware shop in Moortown, Leeds, said: "We had so many wonderful times there and looking back it's incredible.

"We made the bungalow using knowledge picked up from woodwork lessons at school and we used an engineer's hammer, two antique planes and a couple of old chisels.

"We built it in sections so it could be transported and we took it to Howgill on two lorries on August Bank Holiday 1935."

They started their build on Boxing Day 1934 and worked for three weeks. They completed their project when they were home from boarding school in the four-week Easter holidays that followed.

The old windows and doors were donated by their grandmother's friends and they created space for an old wood-burning cooking stove in an alcove. Their sister Nan painted the bungalow green on the outside and cream indoors.

Pam and Roy Atherton have since added a sophisticated composting toilet imported from Canada, a Calor gas cooker, water tank and strip lights powered by a battery.

Mrs Atherton, from Leeds, said: "We bring drinking water with us and we tend to wash in the stream. It's a peaceful, magical place where you can shut out the rest of the world. Time stands still there.

"There is no TV, just a radio and books to read."

The Athertons now pay the landowner 750 a year for the site and Craven Council 248 in non-domestic rates.

They are selling their holiday home reluctantly and it comes ready to use with all furniture, fittings and even crockery and cutlery included.

"It has got to the point where we don't use it like we used to. Our sons both live away and so they don't use it either," said Mrs Atherton.

n For more details about the bungalow, contact Pam and Roy Atherton

using email [email protected]

Idyllic 'Swallows and amazons' life

John and Bill Richardson's bungalow and the surrounding countryside looks much as it did in the 1930s, but how times have changed.

The boys and their sister Nan enjoyed a Swallows and Amazons-style existence there that would be impossible today.

The three children spent eight weeks of their summer school holidays at the Howgill bungalow with their parents travelling down from Leeds at weekends.

There were no TVs, laptops or electronic gadgets to keep them amused, so the children spent days playing in the fields and swimming. They also made their own boat and dammed up the stream so they could sail in it.

His parents' ashes and those of his sister and cousin are scattered in a special spot that his mother always referred to as: "The place of peace which passeth all understanding."