Spring in the Scottish Borders

As the clocks went forward and we entered British Summertime 'twas a typical British Bank Holiday weatherwise - some sun interspersed with bucket loads of rain :-/ Still did provide some wonderful natural phenomenon - 

double rainbow over Jeans back garden

Easter Friday was by far the best day so took ourselves off up the Solway coast, through Dumfries and Galloway, firstly to the Logan Botanical Garden. Set at the south western tip of Scotland it benefits from the warming influence and mild conditions created by the Gulf Stream it hosts over 5,000 different trees, shrubs, herbs and bulbs.

rhododendrons, azaleas and magnolia were in full bloom here
yet elsewhere they are still in bud

yep, palm trees in Scotland :) centerpiece one of the oldest known trees
with only around 100 or so growing in the wild

amazing rebirth of giant wild rhubarb

Then onto Castle Kennedy Gardens, inspired by the 2nd Earl of Stair in the early 19th century. The gardens contain  terraces and land sculptures bounded on one side by the White Loch and on the other the Black Loch. Through the centre, leading from the castle ruin to the stately home is a 150 yo Monkey Puzzle Avenue.

entrance to the
walled garden

in season the pond is a carpet
of Victorian water lilies

Finished off the long weekend with a walk round Talkin Tarn, not far from Carlisle. Arrived in sunshine, got half way round and the heavens opened - we got drenched - then drove back through blue skies and sunshine again!

Ah yes - a typical British Bank Holiday !

Golden Triangle 2016

Know I've waxed a bit lyrical about the daffs this year but the conditions have been just right and the gardens and wood around Gloucester are carpeted in gold. Wild daffodils flower from February to early April in the UK and are blooming in the woods, meadows, hedgerows, gardens and some churchyards. In north Gloucestershire/South Herefordshire, many of the sites have been joined together by the creation of a circular walk called the Daffodil Way.

The Daffodil Weekend

Oxenhall

Oxenhall is a small village situated in the north of the district, renowned for its wild daffodils.  Every year Oxenhall is host to its annual Daffodil Weekend in March, taking in amazing woodland walks. The Dymock Woods site comprises Dymock Wood, Daw's coppice, Betty Daw's Wood and Colonel's Grove.

Betty Daw's Wood is a large ancient woodland best known for its spectacular show of wild daffodils but it also contains a wealth of other plants and animals such as the wild service tree, small-leaved lime and rare wood white butterfly.

Kempley

The village, apart from the Daffodil Way, is probably best known for the Kempley Tardis, a redundant telephone box, containing local information and walking maps of the area (one house in the village has a real Tardis!) 

St Mary's Church, Kempley has in its chancel "the most complete set of Romanesque frescos in northern Europe", some created as early as 1120. On the walls of the nave are further images, including a wheel of life, showing the life cycle of man. These are worked in tempera painted on dry lime mortar, unlike those in the chancel which are true frescoes. The Church has the oldest roof of any building in Britain, dating from 1120-1150 and has an unusually well-preserved interior.

The Church of St Edward built in 1903 was described by Betjeman as "a mini-cathedral of the Arts and Crafts movement", built from local materials and local labour. The church was planned by the Lord of the Manor and major landowner, William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp, because St Mary's was too far away from the main centres of population in the parish at Kempley Green and Fishpool, and liable to flooding. The walls of the church are in Forest of Dean red sandstone.

time for a well earned rest

before ending where we began the daffodil way, at Dymock. As last year we shared tea and cake with the owners of vintage Morgan V-twins.

Mad March Meanderings

It was another wonderful sunny crisp spring day and ideal for meandering.

woodland of native
Newent daffs

First to the wonderful Home Farm, Huntley in Gloucestershire. Set in elevated position with exceptional views over the surrounding countryside there is a 1 mile walk through woods and fields with carpets of spring flowers and shrubs.

collections of cultivated daffs and narcissus

and scattered all around carpets of spring colour

Time for tea n cake, so off down the road to Dymock Poets Church of St Marys providing ramblers with much appreciated sustenance. Again the church and its environs were a golden carpet of daffodils. We pushed on to Queens Wood, just past Okenhall.

copious coppicing 

Welsh Weekend

It was a crisp and bright weekend on the Glamorgan Heritage Coast

We were stopping in a little hamlet on the coast, Gilston, twix Cardiff and Porthcawl. Stayed in a tiny cottage, The Hay Loft, just about big enough to swing a cat, with a mezzanine king size bed













the shower room had been done out, by hand, with local smooth black pebbles - must have taken some patience 


and some interesting concrete garden furniture

Main reason for the trip was to see The Ronnie Scott Story. It was on in the amazingly converted Tithe Barn which is St Donats Art Center 

on the campus of the equally amazing Atlantic College

St Donats has a long and chequered history from the days it was known as 'the place where rescuers gather, to its naming as St Dunwydd mapped in 1877 to St Donats - a saint better known on the continent than in Britain. The castle there was restored in the 19th century by the Carne family and again in the early 1900's by Morgan Williams. Its most famouse incarnation, though, was the fortune spent on it by William Randolf Hurst ("Citizen Kane") in the 1920's which also brought piped water,electricity and the telephone to St Donats - G.B. Shaw was moved to comment "This is what God would have built if he had had the money". It was established as the Atlantic College by the United World Colleges movement in 1962 and remains so to this day.

The current resident Ronnie Scott's Quintet were truly amazing. The musicians were outa this world. The tenner sax, R.S's original, and the supreme trumpet player in perfect sync, amazin piano n bass players and the drummer who did one of the best "Buddy Rich" drum solos I've heard - interspersed with tales n jokes from the life of the lad himself and an amusing vid clip from Ginger Baker.

The remainder of the weekend was spent touring the coast, towns and hamlets in the area.

Cowbridge

Known as the Capital of the rural Vale has many fashionable shops, inns, bars and restaurants - but also some stunning architecture.

the grammar school, until the Wars
owned and run by Jesus College Oxford

and a most unusual church

the Physic Garden a fine
example of its kind

Dunraven Bay

With its unusual display of rock formations

A walk up the far hill takes you to the extensive walled garden of Dunraven Estate

Nash Point

Wonderful walk along the cliff road to the Monk Nash lighthouse 

now that's what I call a foghorn

and this is what makes

a foghorn work!

Llantwit Major

Home of St IIItud's Church, known as "The Cathedral of the Vale, was established in 500 AD. The original monastery included a school and is considered by some to be  Britain's earliest center of learning. The newly refurbished Galilee Chapel is home to a fine collection of Celtic stones

Some of the overwash has been removed from the inner walls of St IIItud's to reveal some amazing artwork

Returning via Penarth with its restored pier, sizable marina and views across to Cardiff Bay

and the remarkable hedge topiary in the park

and, all too soon, leaving Wales across the 1st Severn Bridge, which had been opened by the then Minister of Transport Barbara Castle, and was later dedicated a 'Peace Bridge'.