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Friday 31 May 2013

Tick.

I'm back in the bosom of my family after ten days of skiving off from family life and all associated domesticity.....my previous record away from my husband and four children was five days, when I went to the Gold Coast......to go to a yoga workshop with Bikram Choudhury. This time I've been on a garden odyssey in the UK.

During my brief foray outside the realms of my everyday reality, I've been busy ticking off gardening related activity from my bucket list.

First and foremost, I'm pleased to report that I drank champagne at 'Highgrove'.....yet you'll just have to take my word for it as cameras were strictly forbidden......and then dropped in to visit Prince Charles' second cousin Ashley Hicks at 'The Grove' where we wandered around the garden, in the rain, while he regaled us with amusing anecdotes about his late father, while his mother was tucked up in the house on the sofa under a blanket, knitting:





Sadly, they didn't invite us in for a restorative G&T.

After a turn around the late Rosemary Verey's old house and garden there was a delicious lunch in the village pub just across the road:






Followed by a cream tea a couple of hours later sitting out amongst the topiary in the garden at West Green House:


Which was utterly gorgeous and theatrical:





Look at the stunning chinoiserie chicken coop:






I finally gazed upon Hidcote gardens with my own eyes, after dedicatedly growing the lavender bearing it's name in my own garden, way back in Hobart, for years:






It was glorious.....even though I may have been called something rude by a not very nice man in the cafe, after a stoush for a vacant table in the sunshine. And there I was thinking that flowers and gardens made people happy.

Great Dixter was beautiful too:






Not only was Christopher Lloyd big on creating tapestry effects with the plants in his garden, inside, he also did tapestry of the needlework variety, making cushions to go with his sofa. You've got to love that in a man....after nursing my own tapestry fetish back in my twenties, I've already introduced my eldest daughter to the joy of tapestry.....maybe I should also try to teach my boys.

Last, but not least, I saw Sissinghurst again:









It has been almost ten years since I was there last, yet I still felt my skin prickle with goosebumps when I peered into Vita's room in the tower....it's the one place where her presence is still tangible.....probably because it isn't overrun with hordes of people, like the garden is.


Almost the first words uttered by my husband, when I arrived at the airport in Montpellier, were that there was no food in the house and that we were expecting friends in for a drink.....although, luckily, there was still some drink. So I hit the ground running and mercifully, after a momentary scare, my French came back after laying idle while I used my English. Phew. After ten days of cream teas and various roasts accompanied by yorkshire pudding, I ordered the foie gras when we wandered down to the Place aux Herbes for dinner:





....because I wasn't quite ready to cook!

Rx

14 comments:

  1. The garden tour is fantastic but what really blew me away was the chinoiserie chicken coop! They live better than most people I know!! Must have been amazing...

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    1. It was so beautiful....we used to have chickens which we rescued from a battery farm, yet their 'hen hotel' as we termed it was nowhere near as swanky! Rx

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  2. What amazing photographs of your garden tour... LOVE them all and so nice to see Great Dixter again - used to live years ago between Great Dixter and Sissinghurst and visited both often...
    How lovely though to be back with your family again and living the dream in France - think I would have decided to go out too - first night back and all!
    And finally, so enjoyed meeting you in London!
    Have a fabulous weekend... S x

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    1. Those glorious gardens were so easy to photograph...trust me there was no effort on my part as was usually too busy chatting to FF to do anything other than just point and shoot! I loved Great Dixter and the surrounding area....lucky you to have lived nearby. Had a fab time in London looking at gardens and meeting everybody yet it's nice to be back in France! Rx

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  3. It all looks so so stunning. It was lovely to meet you, it's so hard for me to get my head round you being back home and so far away now, phew the modern world!

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    1. It was all stunning...despite the inclement English weather! It was lovely to meet you too! Too true, modern world defies all belief! Rx

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  4. Oh lucky you. You've had such a wonderful time. I am glad you're making the most of your time in Europe. Bonita xx

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    1. Bonita, I've got to say that I'm loving every single minute and already twitchy about having to get on the plane back to Hobart. It will happen before I know it. Rx

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  5. I love this post!!!! Thanks for being a brilliant travel companion and for making me laugh and laugh x

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    1. Merci! Oh didn't we laugh....happy times! We'll have to organise another road trip.....Southern California perhaps....or Floriade in Canberra?! Safe travels home and thank Mr FF and O for lending you to us! Rx

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  6. Fab photos Romy! Love West Green's garden - there's a fabric range byGP & J Baker that was done in conjunction with the owner based around the garden. One of the fabrics has chickens on it, and the accompanying photo was of the chicken coop in all its chinoiserie glory. Love those primulas too. I have an unfinished tapestry that I bought from Pimlico Road 14 years ago of primulas... I think that was the end of my tapestry fetish too. Did you know that the Duke of Windsor used to do tapestry... was quite common for men back then. Glad you had a wonderful time - I would have SO loved to have been looking at all the gardens with you. xx

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  7. They were selling the fabric with chickens on it in the West Green shop and Marylyn Abbott was working behind the counter! It was all so beautiful! You need to finish that primula tapestry...almost convinced FF to purchase a tapestry kit at Liberty yet she put it back on the shelf! Wish you had been able to join us. Rx

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    1. How nice you got to meet her! The tapestry just has a bit of background to do - it's so boring that I try every now and again, do a couple of rows then put it aside for another year....or so! Wish I could have been there with you in all those lovely gardens, but I've been living vicariously through your blog and FF's pics as well. One day.... xx

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  8. Oh Romy it's such a pleasure to read this and see all the high jinks you have been up to. Just glorious. J x

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I LOVE hearing your thoughts! Rx