Stourhead

Mr DT and I were invited to a good friend's wedding in August this year. It was a no children event which posed some problems for us and how we were going to work it with Baby F. It's not that we mind weddings being child-free, he would have run amok anyway, but it was in Bath so a several hours drive away and we were trying to go through all of the options of how long we stayed away for, did we just go up that morning and stay one night with Baby F having a sleepover at Nanna & Poppa's, or did we go the day before so we weren't rushed and stressed on arrival...in the end, we managed to swing it that Nanna and Poppa, and various other family members would all come with us! Combining a customary big family holiday with the wedding! Genius. So we went and stayed for almost a week in the Bath area and then Mr DT and I just popped off to the wedding one afternoon/evening and went back to our family holiday home afterwards. 

It worked out perfectly! I can highly recommend taking the childcare with you (hee hee). 

It also happened that it was The Mother's birthday on the day we travelled to Bath so she was allowed to choose where we stopped for lunch. All of us are National Trust members and we find it easiest with the smalls to set off fairly early in the morning, stop for breakfast at a service station and then head to somewhere National Trust owned for lunch and to hang out until our holiday home is ready - it's a routine we do almost every time we go and stay somewhere in the UK. The little ones need a good run around after sitting in the car for any length of time and big old country estates usually have enough space for that!

The Mother requested we go to Stourhead which was a huge sprawling estate with its own little village in the middle, massive lake with various follies, huge house and formal gardens... it just kept going! The lake part reminded me a little bit of Fountains Abbey in Yorkshire which we had a family holiday at in 2015 (pre partners and babies!) which was also ornate lakes and water features with temples and follies set throughout the landscape. 

The Palladian villa that is now on the site, Stourhead House, was built around 1717, after Henry Hoare I purchased the land and knocked down Stourhead Manor to build this rather grand, presumably much larger building with nicely balanced features, stone columns and grand staircases. We did go through the house, although apart from the library, where Baby F sat down for a few minutes to read a book with me on the window seat, it was pretty much a whistle stop tour as big old grand houses don't actually impress 2 year olds and all he wanted to do was to be outside where he could roam free and pick up the thistles he couldn't touch on the chairs inside. 

Over the summer, many of the National Trust properties were having a 'summer of fun' I think it was called, and they had extra toys or things for children to play with in the gardens, usually on a theme. At Stourhead they had little ride on tractors which the boys absolutely loved, giant jenga and hoops to roll around. We stayed for a long time playing with the tractors and driving them around the haybale course. 

When we'd eventually got bored of that, you have to walk back the way you'd come to the house and walled kitchen gardens, and take another turn to what turns into a little hamlet with a road and more buildings arranged in what I think was a stable set up (a posh one) with a courtyard where you could sit and eat ice cream. 

Then you are able to get into this enormous landscape garden! It was built by Henry Hoare II and designed by landscape architect Henry Flitcroft in a classical style, inspired by Henry's Grand European Tours. The plants and trees have been changed over the years as new flora discoveries were made, or the next descendent coming in with their own favourite type of tree, but I think the general layout has mostly stayed the same. There are several buildings you can go in and explore, and you could find yourself coming across the Temple of Apollo, The Pantheon (I've been in the actual Pantheon and I'm not sure it compares but it's still pretty), the Temple of Flora, the Grotto, or walk over the Palladian Bridge. Every time you round a corner there's another beautiful view across the lake of another gorgeous building, it's really very clever. 

So many of these beautiful watery places are currently affected by the suffocating Blue/Green Algae which is why the water is such a strong colour in these photos. We came across it a couple of years ago at Painshill Park, which is equally very similar in style to this garden with the bridge and little buildings that look like they've been stolen from other places around the world. 

If only I had a garden where I could have all of this space to roam around in! Although the original garden I think had to employ over 50 gardeners to keep it in tip top condition so perhaps I should scale back my coveted acreage a little bit as that is a lot of people to employ for trees! The views I think are worth it though here. 

And, of course, walking so many miles around the houses and lakes and pathways, had the desired effect for us of completely wearing out Baby F and his favourite monkey, Bertie. The rest of the journey to our holiday house was very peaceful.