Cotswolds - 20 May 2006

The drought has definitely broken in the south of England, but before it got too miserable, we managed to snatch a few hours of sunshine on Saturday in Wallingford.
Wallingford and Burford are two picturesque towns in Oxfordshire, and great for shopping.




Our lunch spot was Kiftsgate Gardens, where we were able to wander around between rain showers. The gardens have a lovely outlook towards the Malvern Hills.

Chastleton House is a real experience of stepping back in time. The National Trust has only carried out essential work on the property, and basically it is as it has been lived in by the same family for 400 years. To see the house, you need to book in advance, (they only allow 175visitors per day) and the time we choose of 4pm was perfect. We reached the front door just as another rain cloud moved over. The hall had a welcoming fire, and the dimly lit rooms must have been typical of how they looked when the house was lived in. Most of the rooms did not have central electric lighting.

It is amazing to think that someone actually lived in the house as is was until 1991.

Yews and views - 13 & 14 May 2006

Some English country houses look so fascinating and inviting, you feel you would love to live in one & never leave. We walked around a beautiful country garden on Saturday, surrounding a house of this type. The property is called Vann and is open to the public for a very select number of days each year. Photos really don't do it justice.

Our next walk was rather more strenuous. We looked around the Kingley Vale Nature Reserve, supposedly the largest yew forest in Europe, with trees up to 2000 years old. At that age yew trees have reached a stage where they have grown past being ungainly, and are handsome again. The branches sag to the ground, root at that point and put up leaders that repeat the cycle. One tree had two concentric rings of off-shoots, still connected back to the original trunk. The walk climbed a steep hill, with brilliant views, and took us on to the small village of Stoughton complete with the necessary excellent pub lunch.

Driving through the beech woods is such a pleasure with the brilliant blue haze of bluebells, seemingly floating ethereally above the green forest floor. Somehow, the pavements of Chichester, where we finished the day, just did not compare.

Sunday was overcast, hazy, cool, but fine. A harbour walk around Pagham Harbour was a peaceful start to the day, followed by two interesting country houses, both of which had been totally destroyed by fire. The first, Uppark, was destroyed by fire in 1989, and reopened 7 years later. They restored it to the same 'faded glory' it had before, so a visitor returning afterwards, would see it looking the same. Their display of techniques employed was very interesting. What they managed to salvage from a totally gutted shell is simply amazing.

The second house: Stanstead Park, was burnt down in 1903, and rebuilt in a grander style. After 100 years of wear and tear, this house also has a type of 'faded glory'.

Bluebells - 6 & 7 May 2006

The south of England is currently in the grip of a drought, after two dry winters. This has of course been great for walking, so it was somewhat of a surprise to find ourselves walking in the rain on Saturday.

We set off from Wherwell, a beautiful Hampshire village, full of thatched cottages. The walk returned to the village via Harewood Forest. The bluebells are now out, and complimented the beech trees with their fresh foliage.

Not far away is a property nearby called Houghton Lodge. This is officially called an 'orne' which was the term for a rural retreat, when it was built at the end of the 18th century. We enjoyed the tranquil grounds alongside the Test River, and in particular the surprising topiary dragon, that puffs 'smoke' at you, when you pass by.

Sunday was a much nicer day, and we started with a walk along one of the many chalk streams in the area. This one at Shawford (i.e. sure ford), was a very attractive walk. A second longer walk was in the vicinity of New and Old Arlesford. We were hoping to see more bluebells as the walk went through several woods, but obviously they were not the right sort of woods, instead we walked through stunning fields of rape.

After this walk, we did a tour through the grand house at Avington Park. It has been a prestigious residence with visits in the past by various royals, and today is still in beautiful condition.

Blossoms - May Bank Holiday

An early Bank Holiday combined with a late spring, meant the weekend was like a blossom festival. After a detour through some very pretty, blossom lined, streets in Kensington we travelled to the south coast for the long weekend.

A walk from Rowlinson Castle to Stanstead Park got Saturday off to an energetic start followed by a leisurely stroll around the beautiful West Dean Gardens.

Next stop was the picturesque town of Bosham on the coast. This is where King Canute attempted to stop the tide, and when we were there, it appeared as if he had succeeded. The tide was so far out we were able to negotiate a slimy tidal causeway type path across the bay.

The church is featured in the Bayeux Tapestry as King Harold visited Bosham Church prior to sailing to Normandy in 1064. Harold is said to have prayed in the Saxon church before making the crossing (photo) The appropriate section of the Bayeux Tapestry has been reproduce by a local needlecraft expert and is on display in the church.

After exploring our local town of Emsworth, also in a lovely setting, we had an excellent dinner at one of the many pubs.

Sunday was cloudy, but still fine, so we started the day with a circular walk from Chichester along the canal to the marina and back along the coast finishing in time for the 1.30pm tour of of Goodwood House. This beautifully restored castle-like house in a park-like setting was built by one of Charles II's illegitimate sons. Goodwood is famous for it's races, both horses and cars.
St Mary's House was a complete contrast to Goodwood House. This is one wing of a medieval 'guest house', where monks provided food and lodging for pilgrims walking the South Downs’ Way, headed for Canterbury. The house is so old, but still cosy & very liveable.

St Mary's is in the pretty village of Bramber and next door is another historical town - Steyning, which has 125 listed buildings.

Monday morning began exploring the town of Arundel, which boasts a huge castle & cathedral, both set on hills above the town, a really lovely setting. After a stroll around the town we did a 'proper' walk from 'Lord's Piece' enjoying the bluebells starting to flower and the trees all bursting into leaf at once, after being held back so long by the cold. There was a track marked on the map that seemed to cut off a rather unnecessary dogleg so we followed it down until it ended at gate into a garden. This is not unusual in England and since the gate was not labelled “Private” we opened it and continued along the fence line towards the far gate. About halfway across we were shouted at by the irate landowner for being on his private land and thereby discovered why the dogleg existed in the published walk. .

Our final excursion was to Parham House. An Elizabethan mansion that has been restored to how it would have been. The gardens are beautiful, with many interesting flowers and plants even though it was early spring. It is also home to a rather infuriating turf maze.

London Kaleidoscope - 22 April 2006

Rutland - Easter 2006

Rutland Water is the largest man made lake in Western Europe, and a very pleasant place for a sunny spring day. We spent a relaxing afternoon on Good Friday by the lake after a walk from Stamford to Ryall.

Stamford is a very beautiful stone town, used for all the town & village scenes in the latest production of Pride & Prejudice. The town escaped the industrial revolution because the family at the nearby great house of Burghley House refused to let the rail-way come & spoil 'their' town. This was probably an economical blow to the tradesmen of the time, but a bonus for the current tradesmen.

Easter Saturday started very misty & we walked from the picturesque town of Lyddington past another reservoir, used by the Lancaster bombers in WWII to practice night time bombing. We then visited the Bede House in Lyddington, originally a Bishop's Palace, stayed in by Henry 8th, later an Almshouse. A tour of the accommodation made us less than enthusiastic to have been a resident!

We then did a very interesting guided walking tour of Stamford, followed by a circular walk around Exton described as one of the loveliest villages in Rutland. It is certainly rates as one of the best we have visited. The walk went from the estate village to a folly known as Fort Henry; built in 1788 by William Legg for Henry, Earl of Gainsborough the owner of Exton Park.

Sunday was lovely and sunny again. We did a morning walk around Belton-in-Rutland, and spent the afternoon visiting two country homes. The first, Deene Park, has a beautiful position, with gracious rooms opening onto a terrace leading to formal gardens with a lake beyond. It is still a beautiful home, obviously much loved by the current family. The second, Southwick Hall, was two centuries older and consequently less comfortable, but obviously has had an interesting past.

We finished the day with a walk around Oundle, smaller than Stamford, but equally attractive. From there, we did a short walk to Ashton, a delightful village of thatched stone houses, rebuilt by the Rothschild family just over a hundred years ago. We had a lovely dinner in their equally beautiful thatched pub.

Easter Monday started with brilliant sunshine. We started the day visiting Hallaton, which has a fascinating Easter Monday tradition. First they share a hare pie & then compete with a near-by village in a 'bottle-kicking' competition. The 'bottles' are actually small casks of beer. We were too early for the action, so left to visit Grimsthorpe Castle. On the way we passed through Oakham and visited the castle. All that is left is the Great Hall, built 1190, the earliest surviving aisled stone hall in the country. They have a tradition that visiting peers of the realm and royalty must present the Lord of the Manor with a horseshoe. The oldest to survive was presented by Edward IV in 1470 & the most recent by Princess Alexandra in 2005. The “horseshoes” are horseshoes in shape only, rather large and grandiose, depending on the donor.

The next interesting place we stumbled over was a topiary by Clipsham, an amazing driveway to Clipsham Hall, now looked after by the Forestry Commission.

Grimsthorpe Castle, when we reached it, was most impressive and interesting. The family has the hereditary office of Lord Great Chamberlain. This means they have a collection of thrones from the House of Lords, used by previous monarchs.

The sun had been replaced by thunder storms by the time we left Grimsthorpe, and by the time we reached our final destination of Rockingham Castle, there was a terrific hail storm. Rockingham Castle is 900 years old, and would have withstood many such storms and much worse over the centuries. For half of that period it was a royal fortress and the remaining 450 years a family home. An excellent video captured the sense of history very cleverly. The castle gave us a feeling of the past, but we enjoyed the grounds and the amazing view over the countryside more.

Bank holiday traffic never ceases to amaze us, and we returned to London in less than 2 hours.

Newbury - 8 & 9 April 2006

The Ridgeway is one of the many long distance footpaths in Britain. We explored a small section of it in glorious sunshine, the day before the south was once again unseasonably covered in snow.



Typical vistas are of large fields and a gently rolling landscape. Along the way we came across one of many burial barrows in the UK, Waylands Smithy. This one had already been looted when excavated in 1920. Further along the Ridgeway was one of the most stylised White Horses we've seen here. They also date from 1000BC and are stunning on the green hills, the shape revealing the horse in the white chalk beneath.

For the Kiwis, we found a replacement tree and obelisk for One Tree Hill!

The walk also included Ashdown House, built 1663 in a Dutch style for a sister of Charles I. The house contains her collection of family portraits. The amazing feature of the house is the huge wooden staircase that occupies 25% of the floor area of the building.

In spite of the recent discovery of bird-flu in the swan up north, we dined in the Swan down south. The staff at our accommodation made the recommendation, not difficult in a country teeming with picturesque pubs serving tasty food.

The Sunday weather forecast was for rain mid-afternoon, so we set out for a morning walk to beat the weather. The walk included several small Berkshire villages. We lunched at the final village - Brimpton Common in a pub called The Pineapple. Unlike our understanding of pineapples these days, the name refers to the fruit of a pine tree, which we know as a pine- cone. When pineapples did arrive here, they were exotic and only enjoyed by the rich. Not likely to be served at a pub.

We decided the rain wasn't about to arrive for a while and drove in lovely sunshine to look at Stonor House. By the time we parked, the sky had darkened & we just made it inside before the hail made it extremely cold and unpleasant. The house had an interesting history, as they all do! We saw a priest hole where, during the reign of Elizabeth I, a printing press was secreted in the roof space to publish Catholic literature. The printer was Edmund Campion: captured in 1581; sent to the Tower; tried then hung, drawn & quartered (nasty habit they had). In 1970 the Catholic Church made him a saint.