Holiday Cottages In Dorset

Dorset has over 2,600 self-catering cottages on selfcatering.co.uk, from fossil-hunting bases on the Jurassic Coast to harbour boltholes around Poole. The county strings together famous beaches, the rock arch at Durdle Door and ruined Corfe Castle, and more than 1,500 of those cottages take dogs while over 280 have a hot tub.

Best areas and towns in Dorset

Most of Dorset's cottages line the coast, which falls into three stretches: the fossil cliffs of the west around Lyme Regis, the Isle of Portland and Weymouth in the centre, and the heathland harbours of Poole and Purbeck in the east. The biggest clusters sit at either end, with the busy resorts of the east and the quieter Heritage Coast villages of the west.

• Lyme Regis: the fossil capital of the coast, a steep little harbour town famous for the Cobb and its Jurassic cliffs
• Charmouth: the quieter fossil beach next door, popular with families hunting ammonites at low tide
• Bridport and West Bay: a market town a mile inland and its golden-cliff harbour, the backdrop to Broadchurch
• Burton Bradstock: a thatched village above Hive Beach at the western end of Chesil
• Weymouth: a Georgian seaside town with a long sandy bay and a working harbour
• Fortuneswell: the gateway village on the Isle of Portland, under the quarried stone hill
• Swanage: a sheltered bay town on the Isle of Purbeck, with a steam railway and a Blue Flag beach
• Corfe Castle: a village set below its dramatic ruined castle on the Purbeck ridge
• West Lulworth: the village beside Lulworth Cove, a short walk from Durdle Door
• Poole: a large harbour town with sandy Sandbanks and boat trips out to the islands
• Brownsea Island: the National Trust island in Poole Harbour, a red squirrel refuge reached by ferry
• Bournemouth: the big resort town, seven miles of sand backed by pine-filled chines and gardens

Inland, the chalk downs and the Blackmore Vale hold quieter farmland villages for anyone after the country rather than the coast.

The Dorset coast and its beaches

The whole shoreline from Lyme Regis east to Studland is the Jurassic Coast, England's only natural World Heritage Site, named for the 185 million years of rock and fossils laid bare in its cliffs. Much of the inland edge is the Dorset National Landscape. The headline sights are the limestone arch of Durdle Door and the near-circular bay of Lulworth Cove, while the great shingle bank of Chesil Beach runs eighteen miles to Portland. The eastern resorts hold the award beaches: Weymouth and Swanage each carried a Blue Flag and a Seaside Award in 2025, and Bournemouth and Poole between them held a string of Blue Flags including Sandbanks, Branksome Chine, Canford Cliffs, Durley Chine and Southbourne. West of Weymouth the coast turns wilder, with the fossil sands of Charmouth and the golden cliffs above West Bay.

Things to do in Dorset

Inland from the beach, Corfe Castle stands in ruins above its village, and Kingston Lacy near Wimborne is a grand National Trust house with formal gardens and a herd of Red Devon cattle. Monkey World near Wareham rescues apes and primates, and Durdle Door is the most photographed natural arch in the country. In the resorts, families head for the Oceanarium and Bournemouth Pier, the smaller Boscombe Pier along the front, SEA LIFE Weymouth, or the subtropical planting of Bournemouth Lower Gardens. The golden sands at Sandbanks, on the spit guarding Poole Harbour, are among the best in the south. Walkers have the South West Coast Path the whole length of the shore.

When to visit Dorset

July and August bring the warmest sea and the busiest sands, and the car parks at Durdle Door, Lulworth and Lyme Regis fill early through the school holidays. Late spring and September are the sweet spot, with quieter beaches, settled walking weather and lower cottage rates. Fossil hunting is best in winter, when storms scour fresh finds out of the Charmouth and Lyme cliffs. Out of season many owners drop their prices and relax beach restrictions for dogs.

Dog-friendly and hot-tub cottages in Dorset

More than 1,500 of the cottages in Dorset take dogs, and more than 200 have a hot tub. Browse the cottages that welcome dogs or cottages with a hot tub to narrow your search.

Getting to Dorset

Dorset sits on the south coast, roughly two and a half to three hours from London by road. The A31 and A35 run east to west across the county, with the A37 heading north towards Yeovil. Trains run from London Waterloo to Bournemouth, Poole, Dorchester and Weymouth, and a separate line reaches Axminster for the western coast. The nearest large airport is Bournemouth, with Bristol and Southampton both within reach to the north.

Useful links

• Visit Dorset
• Dorset National Landscape
• Jurassic Coast Trust
• Dorset Council

Dorset is a county on the south coast of England, bordered by Devon to the west, Somerset to the north-west, Wiltshire to the north-east and Hampshire to the east, with the English Channel along its whole southern edge. It is a largely rural county of rolling chalk downland, wide clay vales and a famously varied coastline, with Dorchester as its county town and the large conurbation of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole holding most of its population in the south-east.

The coast is the county's defining feature. From Lyme Regis in the west to Studland in the east it forms the Jurassic Coast, the only natural World Heritage Site in England, where cliffs of different ages expose 185 million years of rock and fossils. Along it lie the shingle barrier of Chesil Beach, the tied island of Portland, the natural harbour of Poole, and landmarks such as Durdle Door and Lulworth Cove. Inland, much of the high chalk and the heaths is protected as the Dorset National Landscape, and the Isle of Purbeck is a peninsula of limestone ridges crowned by the ruins of Corfe Castle.

Dorset has a long history written into its landscape, from the great Iron Age hillfort of Maiden Castle to the Saxon hilltop town of Shaftesbury and the world of Thomas Hardy, who set his Wessex novels among its farms and villages. Today the county leans on farming, fishing and tourism, drawing visitors to its beaches, fossil cliffs and quiet downland country.