The Beautiful Village of Blockley in the Cotswolds, England II

Well, it took me much longer to continue my first post about our morning stroll through Blockley than I anticipated but finally, I am there.

You may remember that Blockley is the lovely village in the Cotswolds in England where we spent part of our vacation last year. We were in search for a place to have a traditional English breakfast and decided to walk to the local village cafe and had the great pleasure to explore the village on the way.

We were walking down the High Street in the direction of the village cafe and passed this incredible beautiful cottage that I couldn't take my eyes (and camera!) off. 

Isn't it lovely, like right out of a fairytale?

Looking down the High Street in the direction of the village center. This photo shows how narrow the streets are. The cars you see are all parked there. Only one car can pass in one direction. You can imagine that often you meet oncoming traffic in the middle of the road. If that is the case one has to back up all the way to the beginning or end of the row of parking cars. The locals are astonishingly good at this, but for my husband and me, it was often a "hold your breath" situation.

I loved the red poppies growing in the tiny traffic island that divided a small intersection. You can also see the traffic island in the photo above on the right side.

There was no shortage of possibilities to shoot romantic photos in Blockley!

One of the many "mini gardens" with climbing roses conquering the charming cottages.

This cottage looked like nicely renovated and very well loved. I could have moved right in. The green paint color in which the windows and door are painted was typical for the area and goes so well with the honey-colored Cotswold stone that most cottages are built off.

There was a gap between the houses which opened the view into the gentle hills of the surrounding beautiful landscape. So peaceful!

The village church of Blockley. The white van that ruined my photo belonged to a film crew. We obviously weren't the only ones, who had discovered the beauty of Blockley.

We couldn't find out what type of shop this really was, but someone made the effort to decorate the window with vintage packaging. One of the many charming details we came across in Blockley.

More honey-colored houses. I wondered if these were new or old. If they were new they fit in wonderfully with the old excisting ones. At the end of the High Street to the right, you see another white van from the film crew.

On our stroll along the High Street, we passed by many lovingly planted up old, maybe even antique, stone containers like this one. It wasn't secured in any way and I truly appreciate the fact that people in the English countryside are still decent enough not to steal them.

We finally reached our destination of the local shop and village cafe. Again I wondered if this was a new or an old renovated building? The village cafe and shop was a hub for the locals to meet and chat. Life seemed to go a bit slower in Blockley than we are used to...

Aren't these Whippets gorgeous? Such a quintessential elegant English breed of dogs.

We walked into the cafe, found a nice table, and took our time to study the breakfast menu. We were in the mood for a traditional English breakfast and decided to go with the local option: "Blockley English", which contained two fried eggs with two rashers of bacon, sausage, roasted tomatoes, black pudding, sauteed mushrooms, and one slice of toast, all for 7.95 pounds.

It also came highly recommended by our friendly waitress. I asked her what black pudding was, but she only said it was delicious, encouraged us to take it, and promised that she would tell us later.

This is what our breakfast looked like! It was heavy, couldn't be called exactly healthy but as described very delicious. The black pudding is the black patty close to the white creamer. As we were eating it, we still couldn't find out what it was made off. My best guess was black beans. 

When we asked for the check we called our waitress up on her promised to reveal the secret of the black pudding and she told us with a big grin on her face that it was made out of cooked pork blood, pork fat, and oats and sourced from a local farm. We swallowed a bit hard on this piece of information but had to admit it was tasty. Still, for me trying it once is probably enough, though!

After we finished our breakfast we continued our stroll through the village, there was still so much more to discover. Since this post is getting too long, I will blog about it in another entry hopefully in the near future.

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If you liked to stroll through Blockley with me and missed the first part of this morning walk, please click here to catch up.

Before I finish, I would like to mention that I am way behind visiting the blogs of you, my dear blog friends. Life has been super busy lately again and I just can't find the time right now. I hope this will change again in the next couple of weeks. Please bear with me, I am trying my best to catch up with reading your posts and leaving comments.

As always, thanks for stopping by!

Christina

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Hidcote Manor Garden I

The first public garden that we visited during our vacation in England in June this year was Hidcote Manor Garden, located in Hidcote Bartrim, near Chipping Campden, Gloucestershire.

Hidcote is a world famous and very influential 20th-century country garden, known for its extraordinary design and plantings. The garden covers 10 1/2 acres (4 hectares) and is designed in the Arts and Crafts style by the American anglophile Lawrence Johnston (1871 - 1958). It is divided into formal garden "rooms" close to the manor, each with its own character and planting scheme, and spreads out into a more naturalistic planting style the further you come away from the house, that blends with the surrounding beautiful landscape of the Cotswolds. Hidcote is under the custodianship of the National Trust since 1948 and is one of its most visited gardens.

Given the reputation and description of Hidcote, understandably my expectations were quite high, when we arrived and I couldn't wait to finally explore the garden myself. The photo above is taken from the The Circle looking back to the manor house showcasing the magnificent, attention commanding old cedar tree and part of the Old Garden.

But let's start with the beginning of our garden visit. The entrance of Hidcote is quite nondescript and if you didn't know better, you wouldn't guess that you are about to visit one of the world known English country gardens.

Once you are through the entrance gate you are finding yourself standing in this courtyard. I like how the huge climbing plants are softening and embellishing the buildings. You enter the garden through the door that both signs are pointing to. We were one of the very first visitors there that day, but after we had renewed our membership with the National Trust and were ready to enter the actual garden, unfortunately already coach loads of tourists had arrived and flocked into the garden.

You can't visit the manor house itself, only two rooms are open to the public that you have to cross through to get into the garden. Loved the build in bookcases.

I tried to imagine that Lawrence Johnston has been standing here looking out into his garden already plotting the next garden room that he was about to develop.

Johnston transformed this former stone barn into his personal chapel.

I don't know anymore in which part of the garden this white flowering shrub was located except that it was relatively close to the house, nor what its name is, but I think it is quite beautiful.

Looking back at the manor house from the Old Garden. I was surprised that in June so many alliums were still in bloom. They always look great when planted in masses. 

In this part of the garden the color scheme was rather traditional, with different shades of lavender and pink blooms at the time of our visit. I think these colors go rather well with the house and are soothing and pleasing to the eye. To me this area looks like the quintessential English country garden.

I did love the old cedar tree,...

...but wasn't so keen on the gaps in the borders where lots of bare soil was to be seen. Maybe the cold and wet spring this year in England had taken its toll?

This extraordinarily beautiful shrub caught my eye. Could it be a type of mallow?

Here are two close-ups of the flowers.

Aren't they pretty?

A long tunnel constructed out of beech, I believe.

One of the parts of the garden that impressed me the most were The Red Borders. I think they are truly a masterpiece. At the time when we were vising there weren't many red flowering plants in bloom, but the combinations of green, dark red, burgundy and purple foliage were exquisite.

Zooming in at the green and burgundy (Beech?) hedge. A lush foliage feast for the eyes.

Beautiful combination of bright green ferns, purple-leaved smoke bush, gunnera, cannas and bronze colored cordylines.

People, who read my blog regularly probably know by now, that if there is one color that I don't like, it is red. But I was so fascinated by these borders, they truly changed my mind. My biggest takeaway from Hidcote is that there is no color per se that I dislike. It all depends on the color combinations and surrounding plants, then any color can be totally stunning.

The Red Borders seen from the other side. Unfortunately there were boundaries made out of pliable wood branches that prevented you from strolling over the grass path through the Red Borders to admire the plants up close. Such a pity! But they probably tried to preserve the lawn.

I have read that there are red flowering roses and dahlias and orange-red daylilies planted in these borders. Imagine the vibrancy that these blooms would add.

There are big patches of bare soil to be found in these borders, too. I am surprised by that, since one of the planting principles that Lawrence Johnston would follow is to "plant thickly".

Love the beautiful terracotta container with the cordyline planted in it.

One plant, that was in bloom, was this red beauty, which identity is unknown to me. I would love to find out what it is. So if you, dear readers, have any ideas about its name, please leave a comment.

The Red Borders were created by Lawrence Johnston between 1910 and 1914, and I wonder how original the planting scheme is that you see today in comparison to what Johnston may have used when he designed these borders.

In any case the color scheme and plant selection of these borders must have been mind-boggling at the time of their creation and probably have caused quite a stir. Even nowadays you can't help but be in awe of them and admire Johnston's braveness in garden design and his great plantsmanship. No wonder that Hidcote is considered to be one of the most influential gardens of its time.

I intend to write more entrees about our visit to Hidcote, so if you liked this one and are curious to see more of this great garden, please come back and pay my blog another visit until then:

See you in the garden!

Christina

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The Beautiful Village of Blockley in the Cotswolds, England I

We are on vacation in England right now and I would like to take you on an early morning walk through the beautiful ancient village of Blockley. Blockley is located in the Cotswolds, an area quite famous for its outstanding beauty of the landscape, in the county of Gloucestershire in England, where we were renting a self catering cottage for a week. Usually we started the day with a healthy breakfast at our cottage but that morning we felt like having a traditional English Breakfast and decided to head out to the local village cafe and explore the village in a leisurely morning stroll by foot. The photos which are following I took on the way.

Leaving the cottage you step into a tiny but very lovingly planted cottage garden. The raised small terrace offered a very nice place to sit and enjoy the moment.

I especially liked this plant, I believe it is a Geum, which up to now I only was able to admire on photos from other garden bloggers.

Looking back through the garden gate towards 'Alice Cottage' to the right.

There was certainly no shortage of pretty cottages in Blockley.

Many of them build of the famous honey colored Cotswold stone that was quarried in the area.

Looking down the High Street of Blockley.

I love the climbing roses that were grown on many of the cottage walls. So pretty!

Here is a particular nice example of a climbing rose.

Looks like Mother Nature took over this front yard. All the rain that they have in England makes it possible that plants can thrive, even if they are not tended to by a gardener.

 I loved the beautiful detailed stone work around the door.

Many people make an effort to prettify their cottages with plants grown in containers.

The Crown Inn & Hotel looks nice from the outside, but the dinner we had there during our stay was disappointingly bland and boring.

Cottage garden charm! There is hardly any space to garden in, but British gardeners work their magic anyways!

My husband noticed the planter to the left of the door and commanded me to take a photo. So I happily obliged.

This was my favorite scene from the High Street. The pink climbing rose is just amazing and it smells very strong. Unfortunately I don't know what variety it is.

I will continue the walk through Blockley in my next post. If you want to see more scenes from this lovely village and also what our traditional English Breakfast looked like, stop by here soon.

In case you have read my last post and wonder about the Doberman puppies. Two of them have been adopted out before our trip to England. We have decided to keep one puppy, and this one is very well taken care of by our wonderful dog sitters. Still, it was a little hard to leave her behind, but we have booked this vacation six months ago and didn't had one last year, so with a little heavy heart we decided to go. We see our puppy over FaceTime almost every day though, and she seems to do very well. It looks like that we miss her more than she misses us, which is a good thing.

Wishing everyone a lovely rest of the weekend!

Warm regards,

Christina

I am linking to

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