Stratford-upon-Avon Butterfly Farm

One of the highlights of our trip to Stratford last week was a visit to the Stratford-upon-Avon butterfly farm. You can use Clubcard vouchers to pay for entry. Stupidly, I didn't check the website before we went. I won't make that mistake again! The butterflies were spectacular, and the photos speak for themselves.

The butterflies obviously felt that we smell sweet!

Finding the Lost Gardens of Heligan

One of the places we really wanted to revisit on our Cornish holiday was "The Lost Gardens of Heligan". DH and I visited in the 1990s. We had fantastic memories of it and we were keen to see what had changed.  

The original estate went into decline after the First World War when many of the staff went off to fight. The "big house" was eventually sold off in the 1970s. In 1990 the gardens were rediscovered under a tangle of laurel, and the restoration has been going on ever since. 

This friendly gentleman greets you as you arrive. I think he could do with a hair cut! Heligan is a very large garden, covering 200 acres, but we did our best to see as much as we could. In the morning we walked in the woodland and the "Jungle" and after our picnic lunch we explored the formal gardens and the kitchen garden.

 

The "jungle" looked almost prehistoric. Dragonflies zipped around the tree ferns and palm trees reached upwards. 

I felt much more comfortable in the large walled kitchen garden. This rather well-to-do scarecrow kept watch over orderly rows of vegetables and flowers.

I loved the way the rows of dahlias were nestled between the runner beans and cordon apple arches. I assume these were for cutting for the big house.

The pineapple pit was built in the early nineteenth century. The local gentry would compete to see who could grow the biggest fruit. They also grew melons, which were hung in little nets as they grew.

The formal gardens were spectacular, with well thought out colour schemes. There were lots of nooks and crannies to explore, far more than we could manage in one day. We were happy but tired by the end, and grateful to return to our cottage to recover!

  

Warnham nature reserve

It feels very strange in our house at the moment as DH and DD are both away. Yesterday DS and I decided to check out Warnham nature reserve, which is on the outskirts of a nearby town. DS is currently loving wildlife photography and I need very little excuse to abandon my housework and disappear into the countryside for a while!

Warnham is run by the local council, and only charges a nominal entrance fee. We loved it. We sat in the meadow and watched the insects.

 

We were dazzled by the light on the water of a millpond.

DS took this one!

 We wandered through the woods and marvelled at the butterflies.

A comma butterfly

We were very glad we didn't meet any stag beetles!

A stag beetle hotel!

We lingered in the hide watching birds on the feeders. We loved the antics of the chaffinches.

The squirrels amused us with their acrobatics.

DS took this one too!

We got very excited when we saw a greater spotted woodpecker!

And this one!

We had a fabulous, peaceful afternoon. I felt very blessed!

Ardingly reservoir

We love picnics in our house. As soon as the sun comes out in Spring, the picnic blanket is unearthed and the cool-bag is cleaned out ready for another year. This year they have had plenty of use with the unusually sunny weather we have been enjoying. This morning I threw a few sandwiches together and this afternoon we headed out to Ardingly Reservoir. 

It tends to be a peaceful spot as it is off the beaten track. There is usually a small car-parking charge, but the machine has been broken for months. There is a large hill which seems to have been specifically designed for rolling down. (Tested by the children.) There is also a watersports activity centre which sells cheap ice creams. (Very important!)

After we had eaten our picnic we took ourselves off for a walk. We didn't get very far this time as we got completely distracted by a meadow area which was humming vigorously.

We recently bought DS an inexpensive camera as he has been showing such an interest in wildlife photography, (see post here). It was a kind of un-birthday present; the poor boy's birthday is two days before Christmas and it is a long time between presents. We also feared for my camera's safety as he was hanging out of the window with it! 

There is an amazing amount of insects to be found in a patch of grassland. DS was in his element and got busy with his camera:

 

I am no wildlife expert. I looked at the photo and mumbled "Err, cricket?". Fortunately there is a great website called iSpot which is run by the Open University. If you upload a photo of your sighting someone will usually identify it for you. This evening it took less than an hour for some clever person to identify this as a Roesel's Bush-cricket.

Fortunately this one was a little easier:

 

Even I know a bumblebee when I see one!

We're going to the zoo...

DD is a bit of an adrenaline junkie, which surprises most people who know her as she is a very quiet child. However, she loves roller-coasters and has infected her brother with her enthusiasm. Their idea of a brilliant day out is to visit a theme park. I have never yet paid anything like full entrance price. Yesterday I used my points from S*insburys to pay for entrance to Chessington World of Adventures.

This ticks a number of boxes; fun, scary and exciting roller-coasters for my thrill-seeking offspring and an aquarium and zoo for their more sedate mother. The children are old and trustworthy enough to go around the rides themselves, leaving me and my camera to explore the zoo.

This is a Grevy's zebra. Aren't those patterns fabulous? Apparently each pattern is unique.

Who can resist meerkats?

Well, I can't! This little chap was acting as sentinel.

They had proper big zoo animals as well, including an iconic Asiatic lion:

I was very glad there was some sturdy, thick glass between me and this fellow:

These are Humboldt penguins from South America.

This sea-lion was having a break between shows.

These are Asian short-clawed otters. I arrived just after feeding time:

Like most zoos in the UK, Chessington is actively involved in conservation projects around the world and they work hard to educate their visitors. My Mother-in-law can remember visiting the zoo on a school trip. I just hope that some of today's visitors leave the roller-coaster queues long enough to take a look!

Ashdown Forest Llama Park

It has been that rare British commodity; a warm and sunny Bank Holiday Monday! Agreeing that it was too good an opportunity to pass up, we decided on a family trip to Ashdown Forest Llama Park, which is a shortish drive from us. They also accept Tesco Clubcard reward vouchers and have a beautiful picnic area, so it was a cheap day out. 

It was the day after the annual alpaca shearing, so they weren't looking quite as fluffy as usual, but they are still seriously cute.

We all had a go at feeding carrots to Llama Tom, who was very tame and didn't seem to mind crowds of excitable children, plus a few equally enthusiastic adults.

There is a short but steep walk around the grounds. Down at the bottom there are some lovely children's playhouses, with a local connection!

Did you know that "wol" in an old Sussex/Kentish word for "owl"? AA Milne obviously did. DD, at 13, is suddenly beyond all that, but DS took full advantage of them.

It was a calm and peaceful way to spend an afternoon. In my fantasy world we would have enough land to keep a couple of llamas, but as it is we will have to make do with a rabbit!

Ashdown Forest

We are very lucky to live within a short drive of Ashdown Forest. "Forest" is actually a bit of a misnomer as it is a large area of open heathland with the occasional group of trees! It is the largest area of free public access countryside in the South East. It is full of wide open spaces fabulous for ball games, chucking around a frisbee or walking off Sunday lunch. It is also famous for being the setting for AA Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh stories. You can play Pooh sticks from Pooh Sticks Bridge but you have to take your own sticks!

I was brought up in South London, which is not well known for it's fresh air and open spaces, so every so often my parents would pack a picnic, shovel us into the car and drive us down to the Forest. History repeats itself and we now do the same to our kids.

The views are stunning, especially on a clear day like today.

I have a bit of a thing for bare trees; the way they twist and bend their way skywards. Today, however, some of them had a little spattering of green; a sign of the possibility of summer.

There was more than a spattering of yellow, as the gorse was in flower.

Lovely wide open skies, with delicate tracings of clouds.

We only walked a couple of miles today. We ambled along, kicking a ball as we went and stopping frequently to admire the view. We heard a cuckoo call and watched a kestrel circle. The children ran about four times the distance that their more staid parents walked. After our huge exertions (!) we needed sustenance so we stopped at the aptly named Heaven Farm for a cup of tea. We like it there as it is cheap and very family friendly. Chickens and ducks wander between the picnic tables and there are tractors to climb on that DS cannot resist. Today there was a new resident.

This turkey looked like he'd escaped from the set of Doctor Who. He seemed to be very keen on DS, or at least on his ice cream. Fortunately DS managed to resist his beady glint, and hold on to his bounty.

A trip to the seaside

Today was the first day of the year in our patch where it has actually felt warm and spring-like. We took full advantage of the unaccustomed sunshine and headed straight off after church to one of our favourite places, Goring-by-Sea on the south coast. DH and I were both born by the sea and need frequent trips to top up the brine in our veins! 

It was a different sort of day to our last visit in September. Then the tide was out and you could paddle for miles. This time the tide was right in, and the waves were very impressive. The children whooped with delight as they raced in and out of the waves. Sometimes the waves won the race.

 

Goring residents are very particular about their beach huts. They stand in a rank; uniform and white.

We walked past all of them on our way to Worthing, the next town along. Worthing promenade has quite an Edwardian feel to it. They do a nice style of lamp post!

,

We don't know Worthing at all, and have promised ourselves a visit. By the time we had walked back again we felt that we had earned our first ice-cream of the season.

 

DS enjoyed his. Unfortunately I dropped mine! Still, my waistline won't suffer! It was a lovely day just to sit on the beach and watch the sea. DH won the "Who can build the tallest tower competition?".

 

It was a great afternoon, and a lovely end to the Easter holidays.