A Feast Of Gardens Or Should That Be Glut?

Painted lady at Wimpole Hall

Gosh where did that week go! So much for good intentions; promising to post on my trip away. I have been caught up in the hurly burly that is retired life. A very pleasant life full of swimming, sunny walks and lots of volunteering in my ‘National Trust’ world.

So back to a week ago and our return from the wilds of Suffolk and Hertfordshire . Like most of our recent holidays we spend most of our time out walking or visiting old places. A perfect mix. For so many years family holidays were either Easter or October half term, cheaper but often cold and start or end of the season. Retirement means we can travel cheaply during the summer before the school holidays. The plus to this , of course, is visiting places with gardens in full bloom rather than just starting or almost over. Lots of properties surrounded our holiday cottage and we were able to indulge in garden wandering to our heart's content. Lots of them had walled gardens that harked back to the days of self sufficiency. Hot houses producing exotic fruits and borders full of vegetables and flowers. Of course the borders were brimming with colourful insects and I managed to tick a few more species of butterfly off my list for this year.

Often gardens were visited en route. So much more pleasant that a motorway service station . Wimpole House in Cambridgeshire was one such and didn’t disappoint.

I’ll leave you with a selection of gardens and butterflies to enjoy, hopefully I will identify each garden as I remember them.