In the Garden - March 2018

Hi there everyone

Yesterday I had a memory come up on Facebook of a post that I shared a year ago, all about our plans for the garden for last year. How spooky that I had this one ready for sharing today ... I guess it just goes to show how much a creature of habit I am 😀

So here we go with what we have on the cards for this year ...

Once the strawberry bed has been cleared one of the next early signs of spring over here is me starting to get that itchy feeling where I want to get outside and get cracking in the garden.Gardeners World is back on TV and March's magazine came with a full pull out plan of Longmeadow ...
Seeing what Monty’s plans are for his beloved garden made me start thinking about what we want to achieve in our own green space over the course of this year.

We had a lot of work done on the house and garden last year and lived with 'muck' for the best part of the Spring and Summer.

We had repairs done to the external render of the house, which was a dirty, filthy job, but long overdue ...
We also had a fair amount of hard landscaping work done and we are both really looking forward to being able to soften the edges and to just enjoy being out there this year, without the sound of the Stihl saw screaming and everything being covered in red brick dust.
It was pretty gruesome out back for a while. Looking at these pictures has brought it all back 😩

Eventually, I would like to get round to sharing a before, during and after post, so you can see all of the changes that we've made.

So what do we have planned for this year?
There will definitely be lots of painting ... raised beds, sheds, the new pergola and the wooden bench all took a battering whilst the landscapers were in and are looking a bit worse for wear. they are all in need of a Spring freshen up.

One thing that will definitely be on the cards is to replace the rest of the boundary fence on the right hand side of the garden. We did the top half of the garden the year before last and it’s still looking really good. You can just about see new panels on this picture, we have also had a new gate since this picture was taken 😏 ...
 Whilst the rest of it currently looks something like this ...
Then it will be onto the borders and planting ....

The back border is riddled with Spanish Bluebells, which look lovely in the Spring but spread like wildfire and once flowered look decidedly tatty. We want to try and take these out and level off the border, which has lots of peaks and troughs at the moment.

I think you can just about see some of this border on the left of this photo. I hasten to add that isn't how it looks at the moment. I found this photo digging back through the archives in April 2014.

I think we will end up pretty much having to remove everything, level it and then replant.

We also want to make the most of the new pergola area. The borders across the back and the side are no longer really visible from the rest of the garden and we only get to see them when we are actually in the pergola, which only happens on the nicest of days.

We have some lovely planting there which flowers in the Spring, which means it just no longer gets seen, so we need to do some shifting around. I want to plant these areas up with low maintenance stuff that looks reasonable all year round and isn’t wasted by being out of sight when at its best.

We also made a bit of a token effort with climbers at the end of last year, but I think we made bad decisions and really need to give it a bit more thought. Add to that perhaps some hanging baskets and pots of summer bedding and I hope we will have a lovely spot to catch the last rays of sunshine of the day.

Then there is the old square raised vegetable bed. At the moment it is full of random plants that were shifted during the works last year when they needed a safe haven.

After our initial delight at the success of growing our all kinds of vegetables and salads in this bed, the last three or four years have yielded pretty much nothing at all. We’ve tried planting green manure, we’ve added compost, we’ve left it fallow and still nothing. Seeds just seem to disappear and seedlings just don't grow.

The plants that have over wintered there seem to love it though, so I think we have decided that we will turn it into a more structured flower bed for now. I’m thinking of a white themed bed, with something to add some height and planted to give all year round colour. Big plans!!!

It’s also time for us to decide what we want to do fruit and veg wise. We have a Morello cherry tree and a quince in the garden which fruit well, along with a blueberry which was prolific last year, and a strawberry bed which gives mixed results from year to year.

The other veg bed seems to have become home to some delphiniums, which we got off the local market for a £1 a plant, and the three irises we bought from Osborne House on the Isle of Wight last year. The delphiniums flowered three times last year, which was a real surprise, hopefully they will do the same this year. It will be interesting to see how the irises cope this much further North.

This leaves us with no real space for much by way of salad or veg, though pots are always an option ... but then there’s all that watering.

We would be sad, I think, not to grow French beans or tomatoes at least.

finally I want to go big on summer bedding ... in-pots and baskets. Hopefully watering won’t be too onerous and I won’t plant everything out just before we go on holiday!!

I have had a sneaky look in the seed box ...
Whilst pickings were quite meagre there are a few salads and tomatoes and more flowers than I remembered .. and plenty of bean seeds that we collected from our crop the year before last, it would be a shame for them to go to waste.
Oh, I also found these too. I know it’s really naughty ... but we did a bit of hunter gathering whilst we were out and about last year, so have quite a few different bits to have a go at.
It’s definitely time to be buying some seed compost and seeing what comes up.

Once the weather warms up a bit I will take you on a wander round the garden so you can see how we are getting on.

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I forgot to include Martin's objective for the garden ... when asked ... his first response was “to sit in it”. Hopefully there will be time for that too, along with a good few BBQs.

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I must say that all those photos of mess and muck have left me feeling quite bleurgh, so I'm going to cheer myself up by just leaving this last picture here ...

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Beautiful Britain - Stonehenge - Wiltshire

It does seem like an age ago now but we decided to call in for a visit to Stonehenge on the way back from our holiday in The New Forest back in October.

Although we've both driven past and seen the site from the road, neither of us have ever actually visited the site and, as entry is free for National Trust members, it seemed like a good call for a break in our journey.

The site has changed a lot over the years ... it is clearly a big business and it was very busy.

As well as the stones there is loads of parking, a visitor centre showing how the site has changed over the years and a reconstructed Neolithic village.
To get to the stones we opted to take the bus, which runs constantly back and forth and only takes a few minutes.

It was a bit grey and overcast on our visit and the site of the stones was very busy, so we weren't that hopeful of getting any decent photos, but we didn't do too badly. It was seriously 'selfie city', I've never seen so many selfie sticks.

Not wanting to be left out we jumped on the bandwagon ...
... before having a bit of a wander and trying to take a few photos for the album ...
 
 
 
There is quite a bit more of the site that you can explore, with other interesting bits and pieces to see, but we didn't stay long.

We caught the bus back to the visitor centre, where our plan was to have lunch before heading for home.

We had a quick look in the shop, which was full of very uninspiring tourist nonsense and ended up feeling the same about the cafe, so decided to give it a miss.

All in all we were a bit disappointed, had we not been National Trust members, I don't think we would have felt that the entrance fee was anywhere near value for money.

It all just felt a little bit overdone. I guess that's the price to be paid for maintaining this kind of site for years to come.

We are really glad we visited, its one of the places that kind of has to be seen to be believed, but I'm not sure its a place that we would be likely to visit for a second time.

Beautiful Britain - Hurst Castle, The New Forest

This is the last but one post from our October holiday in The New Forest. This was our last big day out and the plan was for a mooch round Milford-on-Sea, with maybe a wander along the prom to take some photos of the beach huts.

Safe to say ... things did not quite go to plan. I don't quite know how it happened but we ended up yomping the mile and a half along the spit to the castle. It was seriously heavy going, with shingle all the way and a mega wind blowing an absolute hooley.
We started out thinking we'd just go a little way, take a few photos and see how we got on. 
Very strangely for us, we ended up getting a bit over enthusiastic and, before we knew it, even though it was really daunting, we had gone too far to go back.
The views across to the Isle of Wight and The Needles from the spit were amazing and we spent a good while lingering, watching the progress of this big ship making its way through The Solent.
Once at the castle there was no way we were going back without a look round and, even though it was English Heritage, which meant we had to pay (being members of the opposition), we paid a visit.

First stop was the tea room, where we got our breath back and warmed up before heading out to explore.

I have to say that this is one of the biggest and most interesting castles we have ever come across.

It is a bit of a mash up having originally been built by Henry VIII as one of a chain of coastal fortresses and was completed in 1544. It was modernised during the Napoleonic wars and again in the 1870s, when the enormous armoured wings were added. Alterations were also made during both WW1 and WW2.

There is also a really interesting exhibition showing the history and workings of Trinity House, which was was of the first things that we had a look at.
It was then up top where views in all directions are amazing and we could get a real good look at how far we'd walked.
One of our favourite things about the castle was the WW2 Garrison Theatre. Those of you who have been following my blog for a while will know that I am working my way through Martin's grandad's WW1 diaries and telling his story here on Life of Pottering. At the moment we are at a point in his story when he is hospitalised and we have a number of concert playlists that he was involved in whilst in hospital. We couldn't help but wonder if this theatre was anything like the one that his productions would have been held in back in Italy in WW1.
We spent a good couple of hours exploring, before bracing ourselves for the walk back.

Our walk back took considerably longer than our walk out had. It was seriously heavy going and with creaking joints and aching legs we both struggled.

About two thirds of the way back the sun broke through the clouds and we both stopped to do a double take, it was like a light had been turned on. All of the colours instantly became more vibrant, the blues more blue and greens more green, it was just spectacular and not something that we could really catch on film, but here are our efforts.

One last effort got us back to the car ...
... but not before having a chuckle at someone who had got stuck driving over and ended up having to be towed by the tractor.
We felt quite accomplished, having made the effort to walk over and back, it's a castle most definitely worthy of a visit, but one hell of an effort to do so if you do it the way we did.

There is an easier option. A ferry runs every 20 minutes from Keyhaven, where there is plenty of parking to leave the car. I think it's safe to say if ever we visited again we would probably take that option.

Holmesfield, Derbyshire - Caching & Dashing, Chatsworth, Carlton Leas & Hardwick Hall

Day 4 - Monday
We decided we needed a nice easy day today, after all, we had a big Geocaching walk with mum and dad round the Chatsworth Estate planned for tomorrow.

After a cheese and mushroom omelette for breakfast, my speciality, we headed out on a caching and dashing route, aiming to end up at Chatsworth Garden Centre.

For the uninitiated, caching and dashing is the lazy way of Geocaching.  Basically, you jump in the car, drive to some co-ordinates, jump out of the car, find the cache and drive off again and on to the next one.


We managed to pick up 9 caches in total today, but the three most interesting were part of the 'guide stoops series', a drive-by series based on Guide Stoops, which are ancient waymarkers.

Apparently, In the early 1700s Parliament decreed that local governments should erect guide stoops to help travellers cross bleak and featureless parts of England. 




Nearby to the 3 of the series that we did today were also Companion Stones, commissioned by Arts in the Peak.  these are a series of modern stone sculptures placed close to the 300 year old Guide Stoops. These also hold directions, not to the nearest market town, but to the future. 

I'm not sure if you can read the inscription on the sculptures but the one on the sail reads 'Canvas all points, Graze the Azimuth, Quit the tide, From 1709 to 2008, To see you right'.  The other one is just as intriguing and reads 'For the other rode, go inward, by cranesbill and leaf star, clear the stream'.  I have  no idea what the mean but found them absolutely fascinating.

We finally made it to the garden centre on the Chatsworth Estate, where we had a very welcome lunch break, before Martin bought some cut price Hellebores.  I know, where are we going to plant them?  He was only going to buy two but I insisted on a 3rd to keep the planting as it should be.  I think I know where we have a spot for them.

We finished off our day out with a visit to the Chatsworth farm shop, always a favourite and well worth a visit, before heading back to the cottage for a nice evening chilling out in front of the log burner and the TV.

Day 5 - Tuesday
Today was our big walk with mum and dad.  Martin got up early to get dinner in the slow cooker, he really is the best!  Mum and dad arrived at the cottage at about 9.00am for a sausage sandwich breakfast before we headed out.

After breakfast we loaded up the car with boots and other, just in case, paraphernalia and headed out into really thick mist!  We had a geocaching walk planned around Carlton Lees on the Chatsworth Estate, which we knew had a pretty long uphill drag to start us off.  We all had our fingers crossed that the mist would lift and we'd be lucky with the weather.

We parked up at Carlton Lees car park, the mist had already abated and it looked like a really promising day from a weather point of view.  We booted up and headed out on the long uphill stretch.  As this was broken up with stops for two or three caches it didn't seem as bad as we'd remembered.  We did flake out about two thirds of the way up though for a quick drink and a breather.





By then the weather was gorgeous and we were all beginning to shed layers as we were just too warm.  We carried on to the top of the hill and were really pleased to see the start of the downhill stretch. 

The view from the top was amazing, we could see the whole of Chatsworth House, the Emperor Fountain was in full flow and the panorama was the kind of thing that makes you wonder why anyone would want to holiday abroad.

We wondered through a field of sheep with young lambs and spent ages watching them gambolling about.  We did get a bit worried when we saw one that was clearly crying for mum and not having much luck.  It tried two 'aunties' and got butted away before mum finally sent out a guiding bleat.  It was a relief to see them reunited.

We carried on our walk to Edensor, picking up more caches on the Carlton Lees series on the way.  We did a quick multi in the churchyard which was fascinating as the clues we needed came from the grave of  Kathleen Cavendish. 

Kathleen, nicknamed 'Kick', was the Marchioness of Hartington.  She married William 'Billy' Cavendish, the Marquess of Hartington,  He was the powerful 10th Duke of Devonshire's son and heir, not only to the title, but to the palatial Chatsworth House estate, along with other rich properties.  Kathleen was 24 when she married Billy on May 6, 1944.  Four months after their marriage, Billy was killed by a sniper during battle near the German Front.  With his family's blessing, he was buried close to where he fell. 

Her husband's younger brother thus became the heir apparent to the Dukedom as Billy left no heirs.  Kathleen died on 14 May 1948 in a plane crash in France.  Her Brother John F Kennedy visited the grave, in 1963, shortly before his own death.   A stone to commemorate his visit can be found in front of Kathleen's grave.

History whilst Geocaching is so much more interesting than it ever was at school.  Though from what I remember we used to spend most of our time in history lessons at school ducking to avoid being hit by the board rubber, it just wouldn't happen these days.

After we'd got what we needed from the churchyard we couldn't help but call into the tea rooms in Edensor for a well earned break and piece of cake, well it is the Geocaching law you know.

Weighed down by cake with muscles seized up from having a sit down, we all creakily got back into the swing of things for the rest of our walk back.  This took us down by the river where the views were amazing, the weather was still gorgeous and we saw herds of deer and a fly fisherman in the river.

We managed to find all of the caches we were looking for, 15 in total and made our way back to the car, washing off our muddy boots in a stream on the way.

A short drive back to the cottage for gingered beef with bay, cheese and potato pie with roasted red onions and butternut squash followed by key lime pie was a lovely finish to a lovely day.

We waved good bye to mum and dad as they headed back to their hotel in Chesterfield with plans to meet up at Hardwick Hall the following morning.

We then flaked out in front of the TV for the rest of the evening and couldn't even build up the energy to log our cache finds, which is what you have to do to confirm that you've found them. That job would just have to wait for another day.

Day 6 - Wednesday
Wednesday morning greeted us with thick fog.  Not the early morning mist that clears to bright sunshine by 10.00am like yesterday, but a real heavy damp fog.  We could only keep our fingers crossed that things would improve as the day progressed.

We drove to Hardwick Hall to meet up with mum and dad as planned.  We passed some longhorn cattle with their calves as we made our way up the drive to the Hall and stopped to take some pictures of them in the mist.



Hardwick Old and New Halls are sited on a hilltop between Chesterfield and Mansfield, overlooking the Derbyshire countryside.  The Old Hall is now just a shell, with remnants of its plaster decoration remaining.  It is believed that the building probably incorporates the manor house begun by James Hardwick (1525-1580), to which his sister Bess made radical alterations in the 1580s. 

At the time, Bess of Hardwick, Countess of Shrewsbury, was the richest woman in England after Queen Elizabeth 1, and as such, her New Hall was conceived to be a conspicuous statement of her wealth and power. The windows are exceptionally large and numerous for the period and were a powerful statement of wealth at a time when glass was a luxury.

The drive seemed to go on for ages and we couldn't see more than a few 100 yards ahead.  We did wonder if we should be able to see the Hall on approach, but we couldn't see anything.

We found mum and dad on the car park, got the winter weather gear out of the boot, which was a bit odd considering how summery it had been the day before, and headed for what ended up being the first of three visits to the restaurant, it was a bit big to call it a tea room, for a hot drink whilst we waited for our outdoor tour looking at the architecture of the Hall, which we still hadn't spotted in the mist.

We met up with Harry the tour guide at 10.30am and he did at least let us know where the Hall was as it was still not visible in the mist.  We had a walk with him and did finally get to see both the old and the new Halls which looked very eerie and atmospheric in the mist.  Harry told us all about Bess of Hardwick and the history of her building of both halls.

The main Hall didn't open till 12.00pm, but at 11.30 we headed in on a taster tour which managed to get us into the 'warm', I use the term warm very loosely, but it was warmer than outside, which was just what we needed.

After the taster tour we ended up back outside, still thick mist.  As the Hall was now fully open we went straight back inside the to view the full property at our leisure and give the weather a bit more of a chance to perk up.




When we emerged for the second time, the weather had started to pick up and the mist had cleared a little.  We thought we'd head back to the restaurant for lunch before having a look round the old Hall.  Lunch just hit the spot.  Hot mushroom soup and doorstep ham sandwiches.  Lovely.  We were too full for cake so agreed we would have to come back again later.

The old Hall is pretty much a ruin but you can easily see how grand it would have been in its day.  You could also see how much of the design that Bess had transferred to the new Hall, including the plaster wall friezes and over mantles.  It's such a shame that it has gone to ruin.  We got some impressive views of the new Hall from the top of the old one and we decided we would definitely have to have a re-visit to take pictures in better weather.

We then had a walk round the gardens, which will definitely be worth another look In the summer, took more photos and had a chat with one of the gardeners who was planting broad beans and shallots.  His shallots looked fab, he'd started the sets off inside in modules about 8 weeks ago and they now had about 4 inches of really healthy looking growth in them and they were ready for
planting outside.  We also learned that we plant our onion sets too deep, his were just pretty much placed on the surface with just the roots of the set under the soil.

It was then back to the restaurant for our final warm and that piece of cake that we couldn't manage earlier, before mum and dad headed back off home and we made our way back to Gooseberry Cottage which was lovely toastie and warm when we got back.