Holiday 2015: outside Worcester

As well as all the time we spent in Worcester itself, we did several days out into the surrounding area. One day we went to Hereford on the train. We had also intended to stop off at Great Malvern on the way back as the surroundings are gorgeous, but it was raining hard so we changed our minds!

Hereford Cathedral was, of course, an obligatory visit for us. Another beautiful cathedral, this one very quiet and not overly-touristy. I had visited last year for a conference so had a sneak preview. We also went in the Magna Carta exhibition, saw Mappa Mundi and the chained library. Hereford is quite small, but we enjoyed a cup of tea in a church café in the centre, and I also found a small yarn and fabric shop! I'm going to talk about holiday purchases in another post...

One day out was to a National Trust property, the Brockhampton estate. This includes a medieval (late 14th century) manor house, now with plenty of rooms open to see, plus acres of traditionally farmed land and woodland. The house itself is surrounded by a moat and beautiful gardens, and only survived because it is at the bottom of the hill, and the owners that wanted a bigger, more modern, house, decided to build it at the top!

Great Hall with huge fireplace. It was very quiet when we went round (the advantage of holidaying a week after half term), so we almost had the place to ourselves.

The rooms were dressed to represent different periods in the house's history. This was in the living room, and I liked the sewing machine and associated equipment around it.

In the grounds there is a ruined chapel, once used as the chapel for the house until a church was built.

Another day we went to a (very) different National Trust property, Croome, which was the first landscape garden designed by Capability Brown, and also a secret Second World War airbase. It was really interesting seeing what the NT had done there - the visitor centre by the car park, and café are housed in what was the hospital wing of the airbase, and there is an RAF Museum there too. A short walk up a track takes you into the Capability Brown landscape, now being restored. There are beautiful walks across the parkland, although it was almost too hot on the day we were there to do them.

The church (just visible in the distance) is now looked after by the Churches Conservation Trust.

The house itself is being restored, but you're allowed to wander around various bits of it, and see the work that is underway. You can also climb to the top of the scaffolding to the "Sky Café", but we decided against that as I'm not really into heights...

The borders are just being planted up, it's going to look fabulous in a year or two. This view of the church was on our walk back to the car park.

And, finally, we popped into Pershore to see what it was like. Pershore Abbey is quite fun. About two thirds of it was demolished at the Reformation (the building used to end where the iron gates are in the picture below), so all that is left is the quire, bought by the townspeople to be their church. They had to add some buttresses to it to stop it falling down after the nave was demolished.

It's still rather large and impressive looking inside!

Think that's all for now. I'll leave my update on craft purchases to another post!

Holiday 2015: Worcester

At the beginning of June we ventured off on a week's holiday to Worcester, a place I've changed trains in before, but never actually visited properly. It was definitely worth a visit, with loads to do to fill up a whole week, and beautiful scenery.

We stayed in this rather nice looking flat. Although it looks nice, it was actually rather impractical. It turns out that having the kitchen in a row down the side of the living room area like that looks lovely, but means you use up quite a lot of energy walking up and down just doing something like getting breakfast, let alone cooking a meal. It would also be fun if one person is watching TV and the other one is cooking/washing up/running the dishwasher/doing a load of washing.

 It was right next to Diglis Lock, where the Worcester & Birmingham Canal joins the River Severn. We enjoyed watching the barges going through the lock.

Going into Worcester was a pleasant 10 minute stroll along the river banks into the centre of the city.

Worcester has suffered from a lot of floods, and these stones set in the wall by the river show how high it has reached some years.

We did a lot of exploring in the city itself, visiting most of the obvious historical things as well as mooching round the shops. A visit to the Commandery had been recommended to us, but we were disappointed with it. Despite being an incredible building with a lengthy and varied (medieval hospital, military headquarters, family home, factory and college) history, it was really hard to get a grasp of any of that, as all that is on display is a load of empty rooms, accompanied by

one of the worst audio guides I have ever encountered. OK, so I hate audio guides with a passion, generally because they involve silly music and trying to "set the scene", tend to assume that all users are aged about ten and cause visitors to clump around exhibits. And I'm really not an auditory learner, I prefer reading things. This one was complicated by having six different "layers" you could listen to in each room, doing all of one layer took an hour, so you kind of had to stick to one. Except some of them didn't really work as the room we were in at the time didn't exist at the earlier periods of history. 

 Would have been nice to find out more about these wall paintings...

In some rooms there were things to try out, so I took full advantage.

After the disappointment of the Commandery, we were very surprised by our visit to Tudor House Museum, which hadn't been recommended to us, but which proved to be great fun and really interesting. It's in a 500 year old building, with displays about the building's past use, for things such as spinning, weaving, brewing, coffee shop, school clinic. It's crammed full of stuff, with lovely volunteers to answer questions and lots to see and touch.

Just down the road from Tudor House is Greyfriars, a very tiny National Trust property built in 1480 and rescued from demolition after the Second World War. Inside is a delightful mixture of things collected by the couple who rescued it. It also has a brilliant tea room, and you can sit on the patio and admire the beautiful garden over tea and cake!

And, finally, Worcester Cathedral, which we ended up leaving until the last day as we were out and about on other days, or other venues were only open on certain days. Photography inside required a permit, which I didn't buy, so my only photo is of the outside! Inside is glorious, with plenty to look at, including the tomb of King John (of Magna Carta fame) and also Arthur, Prince of Wales (older brother of Henry VIII, whose death really did change the course of history).

More still to come!

Salisbury holiday 2014

Last week we had a few days away in Salisbury, staying at the very comfortable Rose and Crown Hotel. This was the view from our hotel bedroom, straight out onto the River Avon, with Salisbury Cathedral just visible through the trees. The restaurant was also on the banks of the river, and we enjoyed having our breakfast looking out over it. We ate in the hotel one night too, but it was too dark to see anything then!

The hotel was 10 minutes walk from the city centre (about 20 minutes' walk from the railway station), or a longer route over the water meadows with beautiful views of the cathedral on the other side.

We'd already done some exploring when we visited Salisbury for the day whilst we were on holiday in June, so we quickly got reacquainted with the city centre. This is one of the routes out from the Cathedral Close.

On the first day, after we'd got settled into the hotel, we visited Mompesson House, an 18th century National Trust property within the Cathedral Close. The Sense and Sensibility film starring Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet was filmed here back in 1995, so some parts may look a bit familiar.

There was a modern sculpture exhibition on inside the house, which included the occasional knitted/felted object too.

The rooms were all beautiful, and it was fairly quiet so easy to see everything and photos (without flash) were allowed. This is the OH looking at some of the books in the library. There are more photos of Mompesson House on Flickr.

On the full day of our holiday we decided to visit Stonehenge, after lots of umming and ahing as the only way to get there by public transport is on the Stonehenge Tour bus, which costs £14 for an adult! In the end we decided to go, as we could get free admission to Stonehenge itself as we're National Trust members. Otherwise the outing would have cost nearly £60, which would have really put us off going. I was also interested to see what they'd done to Stonehenge, as I knew a new visitor centre had been opened.

Stonehenge was actually better than we'd been expecting. The visitor centre building is a bit jarring and modern, but isn't within sight of the stones. More importantly it houses plenty of loos(!), a café, a very over-priced shop and an exhibition. Outside, there are a few replica neolithic houses to go inside. The exhibition was quite good, if not very big. It was definitely designed to get as many people through in as little time as possible!

The stones are a short distance away, and you can either walk to them, or catch a shuttle bus/land train. As it was rather a wet and windy day, we caught the bus. There is an accessible path up to the stones, and then plenty of space to walk around them, with good views of the stones, both reasonably close to, and further away. I know some people were complaining that they couldn't actually go up to the stones themselves, but that seems a bit unrealistic considering the fragile ground and the number of visitors. Also, seen like this, it was possible to take good pictures of the stones without people in the way.

Halfway round viewing the stones it started raining in earnest so we got totally drenched!! There is no shelter at the stones themselves, so we just carried on walking round them, then caught the bus back to the visitor centre! It was very windy so the rain was blowing sideways. Always fun. There are more photos from Stonehenge on Flickr.

On our way back towards Salisbury the tour bus stops at Old Sarum, which was what we'd really come to visit. This is the original site of the city, and was an Iron Age hill fort, and where the castle and first cathedral once stood, but the site had little access to water and was abandoned in the 13th century in favour of the current site of Salisbury. It's easier to get a sense of the site from the aerial photo on the Old Sarum website.

This is the view from near the entrance, over towards Salisbury itself. The site was first used in the Iron Age, and first appears in documentary records during the Roman occupation. After the Conquest, William the Conqueror built the castle on the site.

Inside the castle, the remains of the Courtyard House. The walls were demolished when the city was abandoned, and the stone taken away to use in building the new Salisbury.

This is the view from what remains of the ramparts, to the remains of the cathedral. The first cathedral was begun in 1075, but was damaged in a thunderstorm in 1092, only five days after it was consecrated. Work on the extended cathedral began in 1130. I found it rather odd that they put so much work in over so many years, only to move the cathedral (and tombs) to the new Salisbury site in 1226.

There are more photos from Old Sarum on Flickr.
And that was about it. We returned to Salisbury for another night at the hotel, before catching the train back to Staines the next day.

Gower peninsula

Last weekend I went to Wales on the train to visit the Gower Peninsula, where my brother's family live.

It's an area of beautiful beaches as well as countryside and history. We did a lot of walking in the area, this is the Mumbles Lighthouse, which was unusually accessible as the tide was really low (don't think I'd have risked going over there though!).

It was raining on my journey over, but after I'd arrived the sun came out and we could enjoy the scenery. This is another view of Swansea Bay, looking over towards Swansea from the Mumbles side.

We visited the new Mumbles lifeboat station. This lifeboat is absolutely huge and can apparently carry over 100 people should it need to.

The next day, whilst my brother was at work, the rest of us climbed over a big hill to Langland Bay. This one used to be really sandy, but lots of pebbles were washed up over the winter, so it's much more of a pebbly beach now. It also had some really smelly seaweed!

And that evening we went to Caswell Bay. We walked down to it through Bishop's Wood nature reserve. This bay is a lot more sandy, and my nephews enjoyed kicking a football around whilst the adults had a cup of tea on the beach!

We left it just as the tide was coming in and the sun going down.

That afternoon I'd also found the Red House Quilting shop, on the way to the park, which had a lovely range of quilting supplies, plus a room with yarn at the back. I found this ball of Regia 4 ply sock yarn, in plain purple, which should be useful for socks with intricate stitch patterns.

And, of course, I needed a project to do on the train there and back, and the existing cardigan project is quite big. So, having read on Roobeedoo's blog about knitting the Wise Hilda's Basic Ribbed Socks, and how the heel turned out quite narrow on this pattern, I thought this might be the one for me as I have the world's narrowest heels... I paired it with a ball of sock yarn from my stash, Bergère de France Opal (which seems to have been manufactured by the makers of Opal sock yarn, just branded differently). I think it looks even better knitted up than it does in the ball! Love those stripes.

So, I got as far as the leg and turning the heel whilst I was away.

Bradford-on-Avon holiday 2014: the history stuff

Still getting caught up with blogging about our holiday. I have finally finished all the coursework assignments I've been working on since January for a leadership and management qualification, which means I now have more time to do important things like blogging, and knitting(!).

These are the history related things we did whilst we were away in Bradford-on-Avon. I can't believe it was two months ago now. Better get planning the next holiday...

Sunday
On the Sunday, after I'd been to church (Holy Trinity), we visited places in Bradford itself. This included the Saxon Church of St Laurence a tiny, cool (literally) little church tucked away behind Holy Trinity. It's possibly about 1300 years old (well, bits of it anyway, but probably more like 1000 years), and amusingly was "lost" for quite a while, which is the reason it's survived at all! It is still occasionally used for worship.

Entrance to the Saxon Church

Looking towards the altar

Then we crossed the river, admiring the views of the old mill buildings as we went

and walked up to the Tithe Barn and Barton Farm - a lovely collection of old farm buildings with workshops and craft studios nestling alongside them. The Tithe Barn itself dates from the 14th century. It's huge and very cool inside.

After lunch we decided to go a bit further afield and visited the Courts Garden, at Holt. This is a National Trust property, but the garden is the feature, and it is spectacular. There are more of my photos of it on Flickr.

After that we visited Melksham, which wasn't very interesting (despite what someone at church had told me that morning about it being better than Trowbridge. I think what they meant was it had a Waitrose, which Trowbridge doesn't), and then onto Trowbridge, which looked better, especially as I spotted a knitting shop. As it was Sunday it was closed, but we decided to return for a visit later in the week!

Monday
We spent the day in Bath, enjoying revisiting old haunts from last year's holiday, which I don't seem to have written up as a blog post, but here are some pics on Flickr.


Tuesday
We visited the American Museum in Britain (well worth a visit, particularly for the quilts) to see the Kaffe Fassett exhibition I wrote about previously. That was followed by a visit to Downside Abbey to see a friend, before we dropped in to have a cup of tea with another friend, before we drove back round to Trowbridge to get something to eat.

Wednesday
A bit more of a history day, as we spent the day in Salisbury, exploring the town and cathedral. More photos on Flickr. Salisbury was lovely, and I think we'll have a long weekend there at some point.

Thursday
Our wedding anniversary! We visited Bradford-on-Avon Museum (tiny but worth a visit as they pack a lot into the space, and it's quite a quirky mixture of stuff) and Trowbridge Museum (bigger, and cunningly tucked inside the shopping centre), before heading over to Bath for the afternoon. Trowbridge Museum was fascinating, with a lot of displays about the local woollen industry. There was a school group there at the same time as us, so we had to skirt round them, but it's a lovely museum. We were also impressed with the way the Shires shopping centre had managed to incorporate bits of the old mill building (which the museum is in) fairly seamlessly into the centre - there is also a cafe in the middle of the shopping centre with a whole facade from the old building there.

Fibre feelie box at Trowbridge Museum

Friday 
Our last day on holiday. We explored Chippenham a bit, before heading to the gorgeous Bowood House. This is what's left of a much bigger house (demolished in 1955), although what's left is still pretty big! What's left is what was known as the "Little House" (these things are relative). There are three floors of rooms and exhibitions in the surviving house to see, including the chapel and library, plus huge gardens and parkland to walk through. More photos on Flickr.

View across the terrace. Yes, that is the 'Little House'.

Some of the parkland, looking back towards the house

The lake, with more park in the background

A grotto

The waterfall

 So, a great holiday, plus some ideas for places to visit in the future. I'd love to go back to Salisbury again, for instance.