Familiarity breeds contempt?

We have been on holiday this week, it has been one of those 'Ourgate' holidays, if anyone asks where we've been..... it's the one at the bottom of our garden. One hundred and one jobs needed doing, all those things like calling into the bank instead of using a hot line to Delhi, getting shoes repaired, MOT the car, buy new dogproof fencing...to stop the errant lab Skye taking herself off for a walk ..alone. WALLPAPERING the bathroom ...done it at last!!

However it has not been a week without its moments, we started out with the Steam Rally on August Bank Holiday Monday...tick the calendar for next year. Tuesday was spent with youngest persuading him to complete part of his geography project a survey. We sat in a good spot in the car, him counting cars, me reading Purse Barley, a lovely book written by a farmers wife throughout the seasons on a farm in Devon. We spent most of the day in this fashion - just the car parks altered.

Wednesday found us in Bishops Castle on errands, but at the same time having a mooch around all the little alleyways that take short cuts across the town. We sat under an apple tree up on the castle ruins and looked down on the town as the Lords and Ladies had done before us ...sorry Bishops and ....em ...well whovever sat there with Bishops!

Thursday the weather started to resemble summer and when we had finished hum drum tasks we decided to use our NT cards and go to the closest property to us which is Attingham Park. I have been past the entrance a million times, I have watched the deer from the old road that runs alongside the deer park, but I had never been through the gates, neither had N! When we parked and walked into the first quadrangle I was open mouthed, by the time we had been round the mansion, the beautiful rooms, the dining room with its gold table settings and 17th C carpet, and the huge Victorian kitchen I was asking why hadn't we been before? How silly is that ? To live on the doorstep and not to realise what is there. Even then we had not allowed ourselves enough time and had to leave without seeing the grounds, undertaking the four mile stroll through the woods and the the deer park or the farm....

Friday - well ..if I wrote it you wouldn't believe it, so other than to say there were other bloggers involved, Mountainear, ElizabethM, Bodran, LawyerLady and KittyB and the scene was North Wales, of rolling hillsides, distant mountains, little towns with quirky shops, gardens and cakes...of course there was cake.This was a purple people on the move day ...cakes are part of it! ALWAYS! I shall just say the Bodran's shop is gorgeous, as are the clothes in it. The hired help was a bit suspect though..I watched as he wrapped my purchase, a beautiful soft jumper in a faded pink...well he would pass muster in any fish and chip shop in North Wales! Bless him, the long suffering 'Colon' I think he should get an award of some sort. I shall leave it there.......and go off into another fit of giggles as I see Bodran's face looking at her mop bucket...or rather what remained of her mop bucket...........

Right... Saturday...sleeves rolled up and ready for action ..wallpapered the bathroom ...start to finish 3 hours flat! N had gone to the shoot to receive new pheasants ...but they never arrived ...he stood around and waited for three hours ..when he came back ...job done! So off we went back to Attingham Park to 'do' the rest......

We met some of the herd of Longhorn cattle on the drive ...they are simply beautiful. Jersey cattle graze on the other side. Belted galloways in another paddock and a lovely big Highland cow roaming around the grassy walkways like a big happy dog. We set out on the long walk of the grounds - 4 miles, through mature woods, where you are welcome to let your dogs run free...Oh yes you can! (Well perhaps they might draw the line at Bodran with her pack of hounds)

The walled garden was our first stop ...the temperature inside was noticeably higher than outside. The walled garden is being brought back into cultivation and this year there has been one quarter cultivated and it is beautiful, with glossy vegetables and cutting flowers and of course huge sunflowers. The orchard just outside is full of heavily laden fruit trees.

We found a suspension bridge over the river, and stood an watched the fish below us jumping in the sun. The deer lay in the shade of the huge oak trees in the real summer sun. We could see them stretched out enjoying a rest in the heat of the day. There are 180 fallow deer at Attingham and it is an old established herd.

The Ice house was refurbished and opened last year and it was a joy to go down into the brick lined underground cavern where ice had been stored for use at the big house. Ice would have been collected off the pools and lakes in the winter and stored for as long as possible in such underground stores.

Back in the main grounds I was soon lost in the shelves of the second hand book store, the tables of plants, fruit and veg from the walled garden, all organic of course.

On we went to Home Farm to watch the milking in progress. Seven pea hens each with two or three chicks wandered around the stack yard ...as did, geese, muscovy ducks, a peculiar looking Canada goose, guinea fowl, chickens, a litter of farm kittens hung round the dairy door. Black piglets vied for our attention in old fashioned brick pig sties. Very large lop eared rabbits had the run of a long enclosure at the side of the childrens area. I peeped into a building labelled the slaughter house and left it quite quickly, there were some gruesome tools in there. Another little stable building held budgies and parakeets.

We left as the evening shadows lengthened, both wondering how we had never found all this before. Once home we had to hear how first driving lesson had gone for the 'baby' of the family and it was off to pick blackberries before dusk fell.