Anglesey Abbey gardens in bloom

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A couple of weeks ago I visited Anglesey Abbey, a National Trust property located a few miles north of Cambridge. I wanted to have a mooch around the grounds and house, as well as visit the vibrant display of dahlias they have every year. 

This first post is all about the grounds. The 98 acres of landscaped grounds are divided into a number of walks and gardens, with classical statuary, topiary and flowerbeds. They were laid out in an 18th-century style by the estate's last private owner, the 1st Baron Fairhaven, in the 1930s. Baron Fairhaven bequeathed the house and grounds to the National Trust upon his death in 1966.

Exmoor Day 5 - Culbone Wood & England's smallest church

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I arose, on my last day in Exmoor, to a dank, drizzly morning, so a sunrise was out of the question. After packing up the tent in the rain, always a delightful job, I drove to Porlock Weir so I could begin a spot of rambling along the South West Coast Path.

By the time I arrived it was starting to brighten up a bit, with the morning sunshine appearing through the ever thinning clouds. I parked up, and strapping on my camera bag, I took the little track to the coastal path. I was only walking a tiny fraction of it, the entire length of the path is 630 miles, the longest in England, and stretches from Minehead, around the coasts of Devon and Cornwall, all the way to Pool in Dorset. And because it rises and falls with every river mouth, the total height climbed, if you were to complete the route, has been estimated at 114,931 feet, almost four times the height of Everest. I wasn’t about to do that.

Exmoor Day 4 – A golden valley & over familiar insects

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Up for sunrise again this morning, this time I was heading to the Exe Valley, located just the other side of Simonsbath. The valley itself is not the most interesting of valleys, it doesn’t have the precipitous slopes or trees and shrubbery of the Barle Valley, nor is the River Exe that imposing, it’s just a small trickle occasionally spied among the valley floor grasses. The one thing it does have going for it though is the sunrise, which ascends beyond the basin and lights up the landscape below, at least that was the hope.

Exmoor Day 3 - A punchbowl sunrise & sunset feast

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I was up at five for a sunrise shoot at the Punchbowl, where I’d been the afternoon before, as it looked like it might be a worthwhile spot for some early morning antics. I got there a little late though, as the sky was already beginning to transform from the lead grey of nights end into the first flush of dawn.

Parking up and grabbing my gear, I took off at speed into the moorland to find a suitable spot for what I hoped might be a rewarding show. If anyone had been passing by they would have witnessed a rather ungainly fellow scampering through the ferns, tripod flailing in the morning breeze, crying out ‘wait for me’ to the blushing sky. Whether it’s shade signalled the start of a colourful sunrise, or it was just embarrassed to be seen with me, I didn’t yet know.

Exmoor Day 2 – Mischievous rain and a sat nav mutiny

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After a very disturbed night, thanks to the seemingly endless rain tap tap tapping on my taut tent topping, I wasn’t up that early, not that there was much to be up for, the rain was still continuing its cascade of damp misery. So after a leisurely breakfast, by which time the clouds had taken on a more cheery countenance and the sun was finally awake, I took a drive over the moors to the coast, and Porlock Common.

Porlock Common is a fetching piece of land that comprises meadows of heather and a patchwork of trim, hedge lined fields upon rolling landscape, all situated right on the coast. It encompasses all of what makes Exmoor such an appealing place, in a way that very few spots in the National Park manage to do. And it was looking very fine in the morning light.