THE GREAT BRITISH GARDEN TOUR DAY 9

Damson Cottage, the B&B where we were to spend the next 2 nights was within walking distance of the village of Lacock. We headed off to the village to find the George Hotel, where our landlady had booked us a table for dinner.

Just a few minutes away, through the kissing gate, and across the fields of grazing sheep.

If you are a fan of British TV productions, then you would be familiar with the village. It has been used on numerous occasions in such period productions as Pride and Prejudice, Cranford and the film Wolfman.

To step onto the streets of Lacock is like stepping back into the past. No sign of the trappings of the 21st Century; telephone wires, satellite dishes, modern lamp posts. Cover the streets with sand and straw and you could be back in medieval England. The only thing that rather spoils the image is the motor car. Of course, people live in these quaint rose covered cottages and there are no garages, so they must park on the streets.

British gardeners have mastered the art of growing plants on walls.

Walking around the cloisters, to the sound of a Gregorian chant, was very emotive.



Then seeing these ancient paintings on the wall. They were found by accident when part of the wall fell down. Layers of time.

Inside the house we were to learn about the Oriel window, subject of the first photographic negative made by William Henry Fox Talbot in 1835. Using the camera has become so important in my life that, in the museum, I was to learn the whole history of this instrument.



The British are also masters at using bits of this and that to pave.

Once again we ate lunch in the car. This time a Melton Mowbray and a glass of cider from the bottle of cider we bought at Barrington Court.

Following lunch we set off through the Wiltshire countryside, only stopping to snap a picture of one of their white horses on the hillside. Probably not as ancient as most people think. Maybe around 300 years. This clearly shows the underlying chalk.

We were on our way to the ancient megalithic henge at Avebury. It came as a complete surprise to us that there was a garden here too. That of Avebury Manor, once the site of 12th Century Benedictine monastery.

The current manor was built in the 16th century and is well know for its clipped topiary and boxwood hedges.







We were to see this honeysuckle in many of the gardens we visited.

Leaving the gardens we walked around the stone circle which is the largest in the world and believed to date back 4,500 years. The man made trench surrounding the henge is over 30 ' high. The stones were toppled at some point in their history and it was only in the last century that they were righted.


Now sheep graze peacefully and shelter beneath the massive stones.

We walked the whole of the circle along the top of the earth workings. The grass over underlying chalk has been worn away by the countless footsteps.

We returned to Lacock for a very nice but expensive dinner, at The Sign of the Angel. Tomorrow we were to head north to spend the night with friends on their farm and then on to our old home town to stay with friends for the bank holiday weekend.