Category: traditions

Our Norfolk Holiday – The Railway Station at Holt

Post author By greenbenchramblings
Post date March 17, 2020
1 Comment on Our Norfolk Holiday – The Railway Station at Holt

This post takes us back to 2017 and shares part of a holiday week. As we are being effected by the coronavirus problems I thought this post would give a little cheer.

While holidaying in Norfolk with daughter Jo and son-in-law Rob in the summer of 2017 we were so pleased to find a steam railway line close to where we were staying. We alighted at Holt Station where it has its name written in cut box.

The railway itself is known as the North Norfolk Railway, with a friendly nickname of the Poppy Line. The station at Holt is run by a group of volunteers, the Friends of Holt Station and there is an obvious sense of pride in everything they do. Thus everything is clean, tidy and beautifully maintained. We decided to ride the train to the end of the line, not far away in Sheringham.

The detailing is full of character and beautifully restored and maintained. Each feature brought back memories of childhood for Jude and I but a secondhand nostalgia for Jo and Rob.

In the yard beyond the station buildings we discovered some old freight trucks and an old brown lorry, again beautifully restored.

While waiting for our train to arrive were disappointed that the first engine we spotted was a diesel. Luckily ours followed not long after, a shining green steam engine.

After a most enjoyable journey with sights, sounds and smells from times past we arrived at the seaside town of Sherringham where we spent the day. In our childhood travelling by steam train was a normal way of getting around so days like this bring back fond memories.

Tags Norfolk, nostalgia, steam engines, steam railways

colours flowering bulbs garden buildings garden design garden designers garden paths garden photography garden seat garden seating garden sheds gardening gardens gardens open to the public grasses hardy perennials light quality National Garden Scheme NGS nurseries ornamental grasses outdoor sculpture sculpture Shropshire South Shropshire spring bulbs spring gardening traditions village gardens walled gardens Yellow Book Gardens

Seasonal visits to two very different gardens

Post author By greenbenchramblings
Post date May 15, 2019

Instead of a monthly visit to the same garden for a whole 12 months I decided to look at two gardens, one small and one large. We have already visited the large one, Bodnant Gardens in North Wales already. So here is our first visit to our chosen small garden Wildegoose Nursery and Garden here in Shropshire.

We visited on May 5th, the day that Wildegoose opens with Millichope Hall Gardens for the NGS, just as we do. Wildegoose is the restoration project of the hall’s walled garden. Here a young couple, Jack and Laura Willgoss, have set up a nursery and are developing a modern perennial style garden as well as specialising in hardy perennial violas. It is an exciting project which we love to visit often.

Our first visit for this series of posts was on May 5th, a bright day with a chilly wind but a day with great light for taking photos and enhancing the brightness of colours.

We arrived via a tall gate in the the brick walls and were immediately struck by a patch of Forget-me-nots and tulips. We soon realised that Jack and Laura had a great taste in tulip colours. These tulips complimented so effectively the strength of colours of euphorbias and wallflowers.

Throughout the garden, as we wandered and explored, little gems of plants caught our eyes like this unusual Cammassia and the strong stemmed Thalictrum “Black Stocking”.

Memories of the walled garden’s Georgian origins and its history until its demise after the two world wars appear occasionally throughout the garden, and exciting artifacts integrate into the plantings.

The teashop is wonderfully old-fashioned and is so welcoming with beautiful bone china crockery in which tasty tea is served along with home-made cakes. We found a beautifully coloured table and chairs within the garden. We are tempted to paint some of our metal furniture in that colour as it sits so comfortably in the garden.

Next here is a selection of photos taken throughout the walled garden for you to enjoy.

We finished our wanderings at the nursery. Always a good idea! Here we bought a selection of their hardy perennial violas – beautiful!

Laura and Jack’s twins always leave a surprise somewhere in the garden and today this was in the nursery beds. A nice friendly way to finish an inspirational, relaxing afternoon.

We will be back in the summer and report that exploration too.

Tags hardy perennials, hardy violas, independent nurseries, new perennial gardening, nurseries, ornamental grasses, perennials, South Shropshire, violas, Wildgoose Nursery

fruit and veg garden arches garden buildings garden paths garden photography garden sheds gardening gardens gardens open to the public grow your own kitchen gardens traditions walled gardens walled kitchen gardens

A Week in Cornwall – Part 4 – Heligan

Post author By greenbenchramblings
Post date March 24, 2019
3 Comments on A Week in Cornwall – Part 4 – Heligan

The Lost Gardens of Heligan is one of the top garden attractions in the country as figures have shown. The gardens were discovered and unearthed by Tim Smitt when he explored the gardens which had been derelict since the end of World War I, when so many of the gardeners did not return. The gardens were totally overgrown, buildings derelict and glasshouses tumbling down, glass broken and wood rotting.

Smitt decided to resurrect them and opened the gardens to the public as a team of gardeners and archaeologists began work. They were called, romantically, The Lost Gardens of Heligan. We visited soon after it opened and really enjoyed its romantic atmosphere.

The restoration is now just about complete, so we looked forward to our return visit to see it in its new guise. We soon realised that we were in for a treat as soon as we entered the coffee shop for our usual boost of coffee and cakes before our wanderings. Old garden tools were beautifully framed and displayed on the walls and the building had a lovely old rustic feel about them.

As we left the cafe a fingerpost presented us with plenty of options. We were most interested in the productive walled garden with its glasshouses, coldframes, bothy and potting shed. So we made our way there passing interesting plantings along the way.

We entered the walled garden through a gateway and made our way towards apple arches forming a covered walkway, rich with fruit. Around all border edges fruit is trained to create living productive fences. Across the length of each garden patch vegetables, roots, beans and salads march in long strong rows as straight as can be.

The gardeners were busily strengthening the traditions laid down by their gardener predecessors. One gardener was spreading seaweed collected just hours before from the beach and driven back to the walled garden by tractor and trailer. Nearby potatoes were being harvested and boxed up in wooden trays in readiness for storage in dark sheds or cellars.

Flowers for cutting were blossoming in lines parallel to the veggies, zinnias, dahlias and antirrhinums.

Leaving the walled garden we moved into a smaller attached walled yard, where coldframes sat wide open for aeration.These sat happily alongside a collection of glasshouses. These glasshouses were the very ones we had seen years ago in a state of total dereliction. Now they stand proud and productive thanks to the skills of craftsmen utilising traditional craftsmanship and skills.

The walls were furnished with ancient trained fruit trees, apples, pears, peaches and plums.

Beyond the glasshouses the potting shed stood holding the memories of those gardeners lost in the first world war, terracotta pots filled each row of every rack where close by garden tools hung on whitewashed walls. We could feel a special atmosphere in this shed, full of the skills of gardeners past and present.