Chalfont St Giles

Milton came to Chalfont St Giles to get away from the plague and finished Paradise Lost here, which makes the village the original place Londoners run to when the city gets unbearable. In 1887 someone tried to ship his cottage to America, and the locals had a whip-round to stop it, still the most direct action anyone in the village has needed to take. The rock stars and the deputy prime minister who came later wanted what Milton wanted: close enough to London to get back in, far enough that London can't drop in. Paradise was lost here, and judging by what the houses now cost, it has been found and bought back several times since.