Tag Archives: Books

The Adventures of Milady in Rügen with Elizabeth von Arnim

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On Wednesday I start this summer’s “Big Adventure”. In 2013 I spent a month working at a B&B in Switzerland and last year and the year before I took myself off to Ireland for 4 weeks and 3 weeks successively. This year I’ll be travelling in Germany, Denmark and Sweden visiting Lübeck, the Baltic islands of Rügen and Bornholm, walking the Osterlen Way before finally spending two nights in the Swedish university city of Lund. Originally I had hoped to travel quite independently by ferry and car but there are no longer passenger car ferry services between the north of England and northern Germany or Scandinavia. I think there is still a service to Amsterdam but that is as far north in Europe as you can get these days. So, to save precious time, I’m flying to Hamburg and back from Copenhagen.

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The Llangernyw Yew : The Oldest Tree in Wales and a Forgotten Poet

… And one of the oldest living things in the world! I don’t know why we don’t all know about this phenomenon. From The Pulpit Yew we drove on to the village of Llangernyw in order to find this ancient yew – more than 4,000 years old.

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Saint Digain’s Church also features in Simon Jenkins’s best buildings in Wales book.

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The Pulpit Yew : Nantglyn, North Wales

Earlier this week I spent a few days in North Wales with two friends. We stayed in a lovely old Landmark Trust property, Dolbelydr, near Trefnant in Denbighshire.

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Here’s an extract from the Landmark Trust website  about Dolbelydr :

“Meadow of the Rays of the Sun

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Mariposa Sculpture Garden

The series of books (originally published in Germany but some titles now available in English) 111 places that one must see includes only the non-famous sights and places off the beaten track. One of the 111 places that we “must see” in Tenerife was the Mariposa Sculpture Garden up in the hills near Arona, about a 20 minute drive from Palm Mar.

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Messing About on the River Thames

“Believe me, my young friend, there is nothing – absolutely nothing – half so much worth doing as messing about in boats”*

One of the chief delights at Ferry Cottage, Cliveden was the proximity to the River Thames. There are rough footpaths along the banks. And, lucky for us, the river trips started for the 2017 season that very weekend.

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1917 Romanovs & Revolution at The Hermitage, Amsterdam

Last weekend I made a short trip to Amsterdam. My Dutch friend, Monique, who joined me on my Irish trip last year, had invited me to her 60th party and I joined up with two Swiss friends (also called Barbara) for the weekend. We all met when I worked in Cambridge and they were at Language School. That summer (1977) Monique and I went to work at a Hotel in the Bernese Alps. We met up with the Barbaras during our time there and have met up over the years ever since in Boscastle, Italy, London, Grindelwald and Amsterdam. Later this year Tenerife is on the cards!

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The Hermitage Amsterdam

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Highballs for Breakfast: Milady is a Winner!

What ho! and all that.  I have to tell you that I have been selected by Miss Honoria Plum of Plumtopia as runner-up in her recent competition to win a copy of ‘Highballs for Breakfast‘. Miss Plum writes :

“The Cheapest White on the List sat alone at a corner table, solemnly pawing an Anglers’ Rest bar menu.

‘What’s the matter with him? asked The Dubonnet Queen of Ealing Common.

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Noble Prospects : Capability Brown and the Yorkshire Landscape

Can I really have been have jotting down notes about my travels and interspersing the notes with my photos for five years already? I’ve just been looking back at my post about Capability Brown at Harewood and am amazed to see that the date was October 2011. My first post was dated 20 August 2011. And I’m stunned to see that that was five years ago to the day! Well I never.

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“We Have Done Our Best and Made A Garden Where None Was”* : Sissinghurst in Kent

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Sissinghurst Castle and Garden

Can it really be three years since some of us from the online book group met up on a summer’s day outside London? At least, it was in 2013 that I last posted about one. That was in Malvern and before that, in 2012, Chatsworth. This year it was the turn of Sissinghurst.

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