Headlines
Hidcote Manor Gardens: Wow!
Snowshill Manor: just passing
A Long Barrow: what's in a name?!
Sun, Snow, Rain and Chill: a fine day in the countryside
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Stream of Consciousness
Hidcote Manor Gardens: Wow!
Deb has selected Hidcote Manor Gardens as worth a visit. So... after a slow and relaxed start to the day... we're off!
Today is for driving round the Cotswolds. Through the officially defined, Area of Natural Beauty. There's already been a lot of natural beauty. Perhaps this area is better because it's hilly?
The GPS guides us to the nearest village. Then there are signposts. All very easy. It's mid-morning. There are already quite a few cars in the carpark.
We start with coffee. Deb decides to try an Americano. Basically, coffee with milk. It's powerful stuff, in a large cup. The cafe area includes seedlings and plants in pots. Deb browses -- and is impressed. There's one enormous yellow flower: skunk cactus, it's called. From America, if the Americanus in its name is any indicator.
Through a couple of rooms of the manor house, into the gardens...
The story is, an American was given a present of the house and grounds. He then spent thirty years designing and building the gardens. They are amazing!
It's a series of separate areas that they call "rooms". Mostly, you move from room to room via paths. Sometimes, it's just a hole in a hedge, almost invisible till you get to the opening. You may be able to see from room to room, but they are each distinct.
There's a "white" room and a "red" room, with plants to match the colour, either flowers or foliage. Some rooms are one type of plant. One room is a long, looong lawn, another is a lawn which is big enough for a game of cricket. One large area faces a sheep paddock. I think of it as the infinity room... The wall to keep the sheep out is sunk into a ditch, so it is not visible from our side.
There are thirty or more rooms, each one is unique, it all flows together. Different themes, different sizes, different shapes. Brilliant!
Deb wanders from room to room, being amazed at the plants and flowers. I admire it all and am generally amazed. Towards the end there is a wisteria growing over a shed. The wisteria trunk must be a metre round! Branches as thick as a thigh! Enormous!
We recover from our amazement with lunch in the cafe. Soup for Deb, cheese sandwich for me. I've concluded: in England, cheddar cheese has a distinct flavour. Much stronger than the "cheddar" that I'm used to. I like it (cheddar is always my favourite cheese) but it needs to be cut quite thin.
We buy a couple of souvenirs and leave.
Snowshill Manor: just passing
And so we drive on. I think that we leave the Cotswolds. We did leave the hills. So we turn back towards the hills. No particular destination. Just going where we may not have been before...
There's another National Trust property: Snowshill Manor. Signs say that the manor is full. No worries. We buy a tub of icecream each: locally made, main ingredients are local full cream milk, cream, sugar, milk powder. My flavour is honey and crystallised ginger: very nice.
We sit and eat outside. Not for long. The temperature is in single digits.
A Long Barrow: what's in a name?!
We follow a sign with an unknown symbol: a square with extra bits sticking out. No idea what it means, never heard of the place that is named. I can't even remember the name but will fill it in if / when I find out.
Turns out, it's a long barrow, a neolithic burial mound. From 3,500 BC or thenabouts. It's off the road, no idea how far.
We park the car and walk.
Up hill... of course. There's a cold wind... of course. There's no rain and the sun is shining -- but it's still cold... of course. It's fun :-)
A kilometre or so following one of the "walks". Following three of them, in fact. The Gloucester Way, a loop walk, some other walk... This area is absolutely packed with named walks and footpaths heading off across the fields. We keep wanting to stop the car and see where they go... but not today, thanks :-)
Up a steep but short climb, up through a clear field, through a wood , following a combination collapsing stone wall and barb wire fence. With swathes of bluebells in the young wood on the other side of the fence.
We pass a group of people coming back. How far is it? we ask. Not far -- and worth it, is the reply. We should have asked the kid in the group, to get an honest answer, I think.
Then we reach the top of the hill and there is, indeed, a barrow!
It looks a lot like a mound of soil covered in grass. Surrounded by a low dry stone wall, but that would be a later addition. The mound has four openings in it, hollow spaces supported by stones. Neolithic stones!
It's really quite exciting!
There used to be skeletons in the various holes, 38 people in total. It was all excavated in the 1860s (I think). There has been reconstruction since then. So we ducked low and entered the holes in the barrow. The skeletons are gone (I think!) and the roof is modern concrete rather than neolithic stone work. (It still looks like stonework.)
Not the most exciting spectacle -- but the age of it makes it most interesting.
Then it's a long walk back down the hill. With time to admire the beautiful views. We are looking over Broadway, a classic Cotswolds village, according to signs. It looks a lot -- to me -- like a modern resort built to resemble a classic Cotswolds village :-)
Sun, Snow, Rain and Chill: a fine day in the countryside
A bit earlier in the day we stop for a geocache. At a spot called Drover Hill. The cache is an Earth Cache so there will be questions about the unusual geological features of the area... I don't bother reading.
We start to follow a path across fields, to a point with a view... And it starts to snow!
Even earlier, we had stopped the car and managed to catch a snowflake or two... It was so little falling that we had to convince ourselves that it was really snow. This time, there is enough to believe it! Some flakes settle on Deb's jacket. Everything else melts as soon as it lands.
It's cold, it's swirling snowflakes, it's brilliant!
We ignore the view and shelter in the car... that is, after enjoying a minute or so of this miserable weather.
We choose smaller and smaller roads as we cruise to nowhere in particular. It's quite tiring, driving along one lane roads that twist and turn. Deb asks if I'd rather be driving along a motorway. No way! These roads pass through beautiful countryside -- and occasional villages -- and we have time to admire it all. But nowhere to stop because a lot of it is just one car wide.
It's five o'clock and the weather is looking a bit grim. Dark, with regular, light showers of rain. (With intermittent patches of sunshine!) We set the GPS for home... It's 20km direct, the GPS says it'll take almost an hour.
The GPS is, as usual, correct. We're back in Welford just after 6.
I can see why Roman roads are so amazing... In WA we put roads where we want them. Here, the roads just wind from voillage to village, from farm to farm. The straight Roman roads must have been a real eye-opener for the locals!
Back in Welford. We don't go straight home. We stop at the Bell Inn. Deb had spotted a parking area out the back, so it's all easy.
Outside temperature has dropped below four degrees. We sit inside, by the fire. Enjoy our meals (sausages, pie). The ceiling is low, several exposed roof beams are below head height. One low beam -- next to the bar, so in a well travelled passage -- is labelled, "Duck or grouse" :-)
Home for dessert and coffee and journal. Deb is already asleep but I've promised her that that won't keep her safe when I get to bed :-)
And so I'd better get to bed... Tomorrow is not an early start. But we do have to pack and leave...
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Dr Nick Lethbridge / Agamedes Consulting
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"A wise man can see more from the bottom of a well than a fool can from a mountain top."
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