Goldney Hall

Sunday 26 April - Another open day event. Ian and I visited Goldney Hall last year on its open day and the weather was a bit rough, however it was lovely and I was determined to go again this year. We met up with some friends and went to the hall together. The mansion and estate are now owned by Bristol University and they use part of the grounds for dormitories. Hidden within the city is an amazing walled garden with follies and a grotto. We had a lovely time wandering around admiring the garden and the architecture. It was a bit cold but a definite improvement on last years weather and I was quite happy to take home a few plants from the plant sale for my balcony.

British Pastimes

Saturday 25 April. Ian and I took advantage of the sunny but cool break in the weather to visit the Bristol Croquet Club on their open day (british equivalent of an open house event). We walked to the club's lawns all the ay over in Bishop Stoke, about a 3 mile walk. When we arrived we were greeted by one of the club members and shown onto the lawns by another member who proceeded to put us through our paces on the field. We started out with a few simple strokes and practice hitting the ball. From there our guide went on to explain the rather complicated rules of association croquet. This is no simple backyard croquet game (which is a variation of the simpler golf croquet). Our guide told us it took him two years to learn the strokes and he reckons it takes 20 to learn the strategy. He took us through a fake round of the game and to be honest I'm still not really sure what happened. But we had a good time and saw a new area of the city.

In Search of English Blue Bells

Sunday 20 April - One of the main reasons for renting a car over the weekend was to find a forest full of blue bells. I have seen a number of postcards and photos of forests awash in a sea of blue flowers and I was determined to see it for myself first hand. We decided to go to Westonbirt arboretum in search of the blue bells and also to visit the arboretum itself. We had a rough start to the day, but when we eventually got to Westonbirt (shortly before 12) we were rewarded with an excellent outing. We spent the first few hours exploring the Silk wood, 400 acres of a medieval forest that has recently got more attention from the forestry commission and had a number of recent planting. It was here, among the trees that we found the sought after blue bells and it was an enchanting experience. From the fields one could see the trees and at the grass line a haze of purply-blue. When we got closer we could see thousands of blue bells covering huge spaces of woodland stretching nearly as far as the eye could see. We also went to the cherry collection and saw a number of fluffy pink and white flowering trees before heading back to the visitor center area for a wonderful picnic. We got very lucky with the weather and it was a beautiful day, sunny and warm. After lunch we followed a guided tour through the old arboretum, originally created and planted by the Holford family around 1829. Father and son invested a lot of time and money to bring in "exotic" trees (many from the USA) and to plant, maintain a breed the trees. We saw a number of rhododendrons, magnolias and camillas in bloom as well as a wide variety of beautiful pines and hardwoods including some giant redwoods. It was a amazing place to visit and we only saw a small part of the 600 acres, definitely worth a second trip.

Castle stop

Heading back from Hay-on-Wye to Bristol we made a brief stop at Tretower to see the Castle. It is really only a ruin now but there is restoration work occurring on the nearby manor house and a historic garden. There are also a numbering of charming farms around and even in parts of the castle. We took a nice stroll around the castle before getting back on the road.

A Book worms dream come true

When we finally made it to Hay-on-Wye, we parked just below the ruins of a jacobean castle, the immediate lawn of which is occupied by metal bookshelves, full of books 50p for hardback, 30p for paperback at the honesty bookshop. You pay by depositing your money in a small box fitted into the stone wall of the castle. As we later learned, the honesty bookshop has several locations throughout hay-on-Wye with various depositories for the money. Inside the castle ruins itself is yet another bookshop. Throughout the village there are 29 bookshops including one strictly for crime and horror books (Murder and Mayhem) and one for just maps. My favorite bookshop was Richard Booths, which had large wall to ceiling bookshelves and unlike many of the other shops had a lot of space, large aisles and the books and section were clearly organized and labelled. I'm sure it will be hard for most of you who know me to accept, but I did not buy a single book in Hay-on-Wye, I think I was a bit overwhelmed. But I did enjoy visiting the shops and viewing the selection (including the odd appearance of the title "A history of Durham, New Hampshire, how that made its way to England I am not sure but quite interesting that it is now living in Hay-on-Wye). Besides the bookshops there are a number of gift shops, a very helpful information center, a number of galleries and a lovely clock tower. We enjoyed an ice-cream as we wandered around and after we had had our fill of shops we took a relaxing walk along the wye in the evening sun.

The advantages of off-roading

Saturday 18 April - We decided two weeks ago to rent a car for this weekend while the rates were good and to hope for the best. Luckily, the weather cooperated and we had a great weekend exploring the countryside. On Saturday our destination was a village in Wales, Hay-on-Wye, known for its many second-hand book shops. However as we were making our way to Wales we made the spur of the moment decision to turn off to see the historic village of Ledbury (although this decision upset the sat. nav. we had borrowed which repeatedly told us to turn around and even said that we were no longer on a road a some points we ignored its commands and valiantly explored the unintended). Ledbury is a lovely medieval style town with a central market hall on the high street. We explored a number of shops along the high street, and admired the many tudor buildings, many with intricate and impressive glass paned rooms (we also passed, strangely enough, quite a few butchers) then took a detour up a small side alley where we stumbled across a small two-room museum crammed with historic artifacts and curiosities. We continued up the alley to the church. The Church had lovely, well kept grounds with many flowers and flowering trees. Inside there were quite a few treasures as well. The stained glass was remarkably intricate and lovely. There is also a recreation of the last supper painted from the original (before its restoration). After leaving the church we made our way back down the alley to a small tea shop where we sat in the back garden and had a pot of tea with crumpets and jam. After our yummy restorative we finished our tour of Ledbury High street (and a few interesting side streets and a number of well planted parks) before hopping back in the car and taking another brief detour to view Eastnor castle (a Georgian era castle which we were only able to view from the exterior as it is not yet open for the season). The Countryside in this area was quite beautiful with lots of rolling hills, open fields and stone houses.

an evening at the opera

Friday 17 April - Ian and I got tickets to the Welsh National Opera's performance of the Marriage of Figaro. The production was unique in that it was set in the 1930's at an estate house. There was a lot of action and dancing incorporated as well. the sets were quite interesting and the costumes lovely. It is obviously a very popular opera as the Hippodrome was almost completely full. Despite being a tad longer than we had expected (which meant not having dinner until after 11) we enjoyed the show.

Sunday 12 April - after attending an Easter service at St. Paul's (the church which our flat overlooks) Ian and I decided to stretch our legs. It was a lovely spring day with blue skies and we strolled up to the Clifton Downs and over to Stoke Bishop to visit the Bristol Botanical garden. Surprisingly there was not much in bloom but the garden were obviously well kept and will no doubt be spectacular in the summer. There was an amazing patch of lawn full of blue and white flowers and the glass houses were both steamy and lush. It was a nice way to enjoy the sunshine and relax before our easter dinner.

update

-for anyone interested in the posting about the spooky stories at Ashton Court, you can now see a short recording of one of the songs from that evening by visiting, http://www.ashtoncourtestate.co.uk/activities.htm and looking at the bottom of the page. Hope you enjoy.

Bath Birthday Adventure

Tuesday 7 April - I spent my birthday enjoying the shops and sunshine in Bath. After visiting all my favorite shops I stopped into Sally Lunn's for lunch and a cream tea. Then I visited the Botanical Gardens and enjoyed all the trees and spring flowers in bloom. Then a I hit a few more shops before catching the 6 o'clock train (just barely) back to Bristol. I had a lovely day with lots of well wishers, thanks to everyone for their birthday wishes.

West Wycombe

With full stomachs we made our way down the hill to the car park and visited the adjoining garden center. The area of West wycombe is mostly lovely green hills, fields with horses out grazing and flowering trees. We enjoyed the views as well as the flowers on offer before heading to the high street. It is a small but quaint and "ye olde" (read medieval) high street, with long crooked building leaning over a s small meandering street. However, we did enjoy visiting the shops along the high street, especially the sweets shop. Having seen as much of West Wycombe as possible (the Dashwood estate being closed to visitors) we got back in the car and took a leisurely and rather wandering route back to Bristol. On our ride home through the country we saw lots of deer, rabbits and pheasants out in the fields enjoying the sunshine.

Flowers, Fairy cakes and a Little Hell Fire 2

After visiting the caves and refreshing ourselves with tea. We climbed up the hill to the mausoleum. The gigantic hexagonal structure is built of flint. The many arches contain niches with urns holding the remains of Dashwood ancestors. Right behind the mausoleum is the church of St. Lawrence with its unusual gold ball. The Golden ball at the top of the bell tower replaces the traditional church steeple. There is a hatch in the ball which allows entry and 5-6 members of the hell-fire club would meet here. Although the church is small, it has a beautiful ornately painted interior. We were allowed to wander through snapping photos despite the fact that the local choir was getting ready to practice for a concert that evening, they were quite welcoming and friendly. After an exploration of the church and its grounds we made our way back to the mausoleum and had a picnic lunch just outside of it on the hill. It was a lovely sunny day and we enjoyed the blue skies filled with small planes and red kites hovering on the updrafts around the hill. I had made chocolate fairy cakes (cupcakes to those from the states) and we enjoyed them in the sun.

Flowers, Fairy cakes and a Little Hell Fire

Saturday 4 April - Ian and I met up with two of his archaeology friends, Aisling and Emily and we drove in Emily's car, Colin to Wycombe (pronounced wick-hum not why-comb as you might embarrassingly mistake in front of English acquaintances. Also not to be confused with the town of Wickham, also pronounced wick-hum). We were venturing to Wycombe to visit the hell fire caves because Aisiling is proposing to do her dissertation on hell-fire clubs, societies formed in the 18th century by wealthy and powerful men during which they revelled in debaucherous behaviour which mocked religion and the polite society of the day. The caves that we visited were chalk caves, quarried to build a road to connect workers to the local town. They were part of the Dashwood estate and it was a later Dashwood, Sir Francis who formed the local hell-fire club. We explored the 1/4 mile caves and tunnels, adorned with explanatory plaques, historical recreations with mannequins and Greek sculpture. It was a n interesting trek. Once we emerged into the sunlight again we had a cup of tea at the cafe at the entrance to the caves before further exploring the sights.