On Friday I’ll have been in the southwest for two weeks enjoying stays in favourite places : Lyme Regis, Ashburton and now Chagford. One of Sir Edwin Lutyens‘s masterpieces Castle Drogo is just a few miles away from our cottage and I decided to revisit on this glorious autumn day
Visitor Centre at Castle Drogo
Tag Archives: Historic Houses
The Gardens of Hanbury Hall
To break my journey down to the southwest I decided to call at Hanbury Hall in Worcestershire for a few hours. I began my visit with lunch in the Servants’ Hall and spent the rest of my time in the splendid gardens.
Autumn Visit To The Galleries of Manchester
Back in June I received notification of this locally organised trip and, October being a pretty ‘clear’ month, I decided to book the day out. In the end it came hot on the heels of the Edinburgh 48 hour ‘day out’.
“Autumn Visit to the Galleries of Manchester.
Wednesday 12th October 2016
Manchester, or “Cottonopolis” was one of the great cities of Victorian England. That wealth is reflected to-day in the magnificent art collections housed in the city galleries.
Edinburgh Houses
It was meant to be a quiet, stay-at-home, reading-in-the-boudoir week (most of October, in fact) but irresistible opportunities for travel turned up and I resisted none of them!
When friends asked if I would a share a day with them in Edinburgh I leapt at the chance. It’s possible to do the trip in a day from Leeds. I’ve done it before. I spent one Saturday in August six years ago at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, which is just confined to the limits of Charlotte Square.
Charlotte Square in Autumn
Oakhurst Cottage, Hambledon, Surrey
There are countless pretty villages and cottages in Surrey but Hambledon and the National Trust preserved Oakhurst Cottage take some beating. Initially, I saw the place on one of my first visits to Surrey last January and I made a mental note to book a tour in the summer.
The Octavia Hill Trail
Nourishing soup to set me up for the afternoon’s walk
Lovely Winkworth Arboretum is very near Godalming and I’ve visited lots of times this year. It’s one of Oliver (pug)’s favourite places and we both enjoy our walks there. There’s something for both of us. My attention was drawn to two other nearby sites – a walk and a house to visit. In fact it is possible to walk from Winkworth Arboretum to Oakhurst Cottage and include part of the Octavia Hill Trail en route. On my last Saturday in Surrey I decided to visit both but after a fortifying lunch at Winkworth I drove to Hydon’s Heath for the trail and then on to Oakhurst Cottage for a guided tour.
Following Vita’s Footsteps : Knole
Little did I know in August when I visited Sissinghurst that the next month I’d be at Knole. It was rather a last-minute arrangement to visit a friend in Sevenoaks when I was down in Surrey the other week. Her home is just steps away from the medieval deer park at Knole and the National Trust property of that name.
Surrey Arts and Crafts : Goddards
At the end of last year I found, tucked inside the winter issue of the Art Fund magazine, a flyer advertising a number of short breaks organised by the company Travel Editions with whom I’d previously spent a 3 night break in 2014 : Art Nouveau and Art Deco in Lille and Antwerp. The trip that particularly caught my eye was “Surrey Arts and Crafts”.
Lanercost Priory
On our way up to Scotland in June we travelled via The Bowes Museum at Barnard Castle and Lanercost Priory. At The Bowes we looked at the latest exhibition Shoes : Pleasure and Pain; saw the famous automaton Swan in limited action and enjoyed a lovely selection of portraits of English women: English Rose – Feminine Beauty from Van Dyck to Sargent. Our Art Fund cards gave us free admission to everything and the Museum – a French Chateau plonked down in the Yorkshire Dales – has a good cafe and well-stocked shop.
The Bowes Museum
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.
miladysboudoir 