On to Southhampton

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Today was a driving day. We left Wells after breakfast and made some stops on our way to Southhampton. The first was at Stourhead. This is a big property with beautiful gardens. There were already quite a few people in the carpark as we parked our car, and some already in the gardens. The house did not open until 11am, so we started in the gardens. The weather was fine and the sun was coming out, so a good day! The gardens were lovely to walk through. A large lake invited us to take photos including the reflection of the buildings and trees on the water. Around the lake there are many small buildings- grottos, temples and cottages. We were surprised that you couldn’t see the house from the gardens, or the gardens with the pond from the house. Once we had walked around the gardens we went up to the house. The house is a Palladian building, so although it is grand it is not ostentatious. It is furnished with appropriate furniture, and filled with many paintings. It took a while to walk around and see the different rooms and paintings. When we felt we had seen enough we moved on. Our next stop was Salisbury to see Mompesson House, which we hadn’t had time to see a few days ago. Before going on to the cathedral, we went to Pret a Manger for lunch. Mompesson is a house in the cathedral close, and had been the Treasurer ‘s House earlier in time. The house has been part of the National Trust for 40 years, and there was a history of the acquisition of the house on display. Although not a large house, it is delightful with a lovely garden at the back. Well worth the time to come back to Salisbury. A number of the rooms had displays that reflected on the lives of the people that had lived in the house over the years. The garden was small, but pretty, and in the sunshine today, was very appealing. By mid afternoon we needed to get on the road to Southhampton. We are staying in Southseas, a suburb near the beach. It has quite a number of buildings that are obviously for visitors-many that are in the style of the Victorian buildings we have seen in the beach destinations we have visited like Tenby and Ilfracombe. Our hotel is also in that Victorian style, although it is not part of a large terrace. We went for a walk around the area before getting ready for dinner. Tonight we had dinner at The Kitchen- part of the group that run the hotel we are staying in. It has just been reopened, and is trying to establish itself as a fine dining restaurant. We really enjoyed our meal. Luckily we were booked in early, before the kitchen got too busy. Our meals were very tasty and we enjoyed them immensely. The chef put some great flavours together. It was one of the best meals of the trip.

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