A good year for the hydrangeas

Today started with a strange sound that I couldn't at first identify from my bed in the caravan. Eventually it dawned on me that it was rain. A little while later, I was getting dressed in socks, jeans, trainers, and long sleeves ... things I haven't worn for ages!

I pulled a bundle of leaflets off the shelf to gauge the wet-weather possibilities in North Cornwall. After I'd narrowed them down a bit, and CleanSteve still wasn't stirring, I began frying bacon and making coffee. As if by magic, he appeared!

We decided to head for the nearest National Trust property, Lanhydrock, and combine the day trip with a visit to the Bodmin Steam railway. I wasn't expecting too much of Lanhydrock: it sounded too big, and the Victorian era isn't my favourite. But the house, although large, has the human traffic flow well controlled, and is brought to life by the strategic placing of authentic letters and period items such as hairbrushes backed with silver, a wicker cradle, and a pile of old trunks and suitcases, in the rooms. The house and estate was once the home of the titled Agar-Robartes family, but the eldest son and heir, Tommy, was killed in WWI at the battle of Looes; his brother committed suicide in 1930; and only one of the four girls ever married, doubtless because of the husband-shortage that followed the Great War. The remaining son, Gerald, inherited the house, and gifted it to the National Trust in 1953. He continued to live there with two of his unmarried sisters until his death in 1966.

I found this end-story quite unexpectedly moving, but it was time to move on to the gardens, as I was getting far too hot in the house with all my non-summer clothes on! We ate our ice cream and wasabi peas
('where are the sarnies?' asked CleanSteve)
on a wrought-iron bench, while a baby robin hopped around under our feet. We fed it on pieces of a raw berry bar, because we didn't think it should have wasabi, being a Cornish robin.

The hydrangeas on the way to the upper garden were truly prolific, and we identified several varieties. I am a bit obsessed by them, because they are one of the first flowers I could name. We had the pink ones at our house in Co. Dublin when I was but a child. I spent far too long on my knees trying for super-macro shots, with the flowers shaking, and me shaking, and the sun popping in and out from behind the clouds. In the end, I liked this one best. But I took 164 photos today, which was about 150 too many!

Afterwards, the steam railway, and a little trip to the fashionable yachtie resort of Rock which is a little like Cheltenham-on-Sea (same shops, but substitute yachting for National Hunt racing, and add a little more cool and seaside sparkle). Then it was time to head for the beach at Polzeath for a little sunsurfing. I did not last long. Today I am tired. We had cider, and fish and chips (minus the batter for me) for tea. As I keep saying, holidays don't get much better than this!