Felbrigg Hall

 
After a gentle amble round the country roads and footpaths near our holiday cottage, we headed after lunch to Felbrigg Hall. Its walled garden is one of my favourite places to visit, with everything from a cottage-style garden of intermingled vegetables and flowers to olive trees and a dry, 'desert' garden.




The tulips were going over a little, but this is how I like them - wild over-blown, rather than upright and stately.

There were irises in an array of colours

and even bluebells.

Olive trees growing in pots against a brilliant blue sky gave the outdoor cafe area a Mediterranean feel.

I've long wanted to explore the wider parkland, so after a small snack we headed down towards the lake, through a pleasantly cool wooded area.





This isn't a long walk but we'd tackled it in the wrong direction, against the arrow routemarkers, which led to an amount of confusion, and by the time we were heading back from the lake I was getting tired and hot, and thought it might be possible to take a short-cut directly to the House and car-park. Sadly, this proved to not be possible. A fence cut across the direct route and we had to go round via the church anyway. I'm not defeated though, and next time I'll know where I'm going, and perhaps even explore further round the park.

Off to Norfolk - stopover at Belton House

Our first stop when heading to Norfolk is always at Belton House, just outside Grantham.

It's not far from home and we arrived with time for lunch before taking a walk around the gardens.

It was another warm day for early May and the walking mainly took the form of  moving from one area of shade to the next.

For a while we sat in the shade of the medlar trees at the rear of the Orangery; this is the first time I've seen them in flower.

Then moved onward to this summerhouse hidden away in cow parsley, and a path in dappled shade beneath trees.

Before braving the sun to reach the pavilion at the end of the pond.

I don't like heat and found it far too hot to explore up to the Boathouse and around the lake, so we ambled under trees back towards the formal gardens and the Moondial before heading back to the cafe for tea and cake.

One last thing to see ... 

On the way in, I'd noticed this wonderful wisteria growing by the entrance sign, so before leaving we walked down the drive to see it. Isn't it absolutely gorgeous? 

 

Kedleston

Continuing the search for bluebells took us in early May to Kedleston Hall. Here they're found along the Short Walk, but, although I'd considered going to find them there, we got distracted by the Pleasure Grounds.

Here the rhododendrons were in full flower and looking lovely.

And I even spotted some wisteria in flower. It wasn't as magical as that at Calke but it's still lovely to see.

We did eventually head up the Short Walk but not as far as the bluebells. The wild garlic was looking and smelling wonderful though.

 A complete carpet of white!