Stourhead and Lacock Abbey

We are trapped in storybook England. We headed south for Stourhead house and gardens. When we could see the landscape above the storybook hedgerows it was, well, storybook.

I'd saved up Stourhead for Lyn as a surprise. Gardens and ducks were a given. Garden doesn't quite describe it (see below).

The house was the usual quite interesting baronial pile, but the landscaping, which dates from the 18th century, is the masterpiece.

(Ooh! The ITV news just said that that they were culling 70% of the badgers in Gloucestershire to prevent the spread of tuberculosis in cattle. Damn the cattle, how can they kill Mr Badger? I am outraged. I shall write to The Times.)

Anyhoo - then we drove to Lacock Abbey and the village of Lacock. 'Twas amazing in other ways. It started, obviously, as an abbey, but when Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries the family of the guy who lived there till 2011 bought it. The National Trust keeps the bottom floor in its medieval glory, the upper floors as an exhibit of its later incarnations, and it has also set up a museum about the Fox-Talbot who seems to have invented photography here. Scenes from the first two Harry Potter movies were filmed in some rooms and the attached village is so 'ye olde' that a number of period dramas have been filmed there as well. Lyn and I spent a good part of the day reciting Jane Austen type lines - "you seem to have a pretty little wilderness...”

  
Below is Lyn's photograph of me in THE WINDOW , the same window that appears in Fox-Talbot's first-ever photograph. The original Fox Talbot photograph was better quality. 

Having spent time in London and here, I have discovered what pensioners do in this country. Legions of cheerful old duffers, and battalions of spry grey haired old ladies, spend their spare time volunteering for service with the National Trust or other heritage organisations. They are uniformly enthusiastic, and occasionally jolly. Lyn spent time with one lovely lady who explained the labour-intensive process of preserving Stourhead's library to her. We also chatted to a jolly old coot about cricket. Everybody is immensely cheerful about Australia's sporting doldrums. His best line was, "Did Australia attend our olympics?" I had my response ready though ... "I'm old enough to remember the last period when Australia had a sporting low point. It was the late 70s and early 80s. I can't remember any time before now when England was any good at all." He thought that was pretty good. As we left he said, "Keep up your spirits." God I hope we win something soon!

Bath tomorrow - the city, not the cleansing process. I am still following Australian practices of daily bathing.