A friend and I picked Leamington Spa in Warwickshire as a good day trip location roughly half-way between where we each live. Our first stop was to wander around Jephson Gardens. Around five minutes from the train station the gardens, which are named for Dr Henry Jephson who promoted the town as a spa destination, were created in 1831 and have been a popular attraction ever since.
Bagthorpe Gardens are a community gardens I visited as part of the Heritage Open Day last year. They’ve been cultivated since the 1840s and have Grade II* listing with original hedging and restored bothies (a basic shelter).
Princes Street Gardens is a public park in the centre of Edinburgh and the first place we headed after booking into our hotel in order to stretch our legs after a long car journey.
We had assumed when booking a combined ticket for Alnwick Castle and garden, that the gardens were part of the castle, but in fact they are also an attraction in their own right and a registered charity created by the Duchess of Northumberland.
Anglesey Abbey is a National Trust property in Cambridgeshire. Founded around 1135 as the Hospital of St Mary it underwent many architectural changes and upheavals until Lord Fairhaven and his brother brought the property, unseen, in an auction in 1926.
Sudeley Castle is famous as being the home to Katherine Parr, Henry VIII’s last wife and the only one to survive him. It is also the place where Lady Jane Grey, Katherine’s ward and Queen herself for only 9 days before her execution at the Tower of London, resided for some time. Lady Jane is probably my favourite historical figure, someone I’ve been fascinated by since a school trip to Bradgate Park, Lady Jane’s supposed birthplace, so I was very interested to walk the same hallways she did.
On the same day we visited the Monkey Forest we headed next door to Trentham Gardens. Examining a map beforehand we decided to walk around the mile long Trentham Lake, designed by Capability Brown, stopping off to also visit the ruins of Trentham Hall and the Italian Gardens.
On a gorgeously sunny day (remember them?) we decided to head out to Gunby Hall and Gardens, a National Trust property in Lincolnshire. A country house built around 1700, it’s one of those rare properties I like because it feels like a home, and not somewhere to be admired because of its beautiful rooms.
Whilst visiting the Bressingham Steam Museum we also visited the gardens which are next to it. There are six distinct gardens laid out over 17 acres, and as such were much more impressive than we had expected.
I’m putting these two together because the Natural History Museum is in the grounds of the Botanical Gardens and also the fire alarm went off whilst I was at the museum so although I went back in to finish looking around there, it did mean that I didn’t spend as much time in the gardens as I would have done if I hadn’t been interrupted.
