We have just spent a super weekend with our son and dil at their new house between Maidenhead and Windsor. New to them that is, but in much need of renovation, they have a lot of work ahead of them, but I’m sure it will be wonderful eventually as they are a very fit and hard working couple. Their house is among others which are at the side of a lake and after a short walk we were in amongst beautiful scenery, with lots of trees around the water’s edge, such a calm, serene view of the lake.
For those not living in the UK, the weather forecasters had been predicting a serious storm, St Jude, to hit this country overnight, last night. In the early hours of this morning, I woke suddenly and there was a huge crack and a dreadful noise coming from the direction of the woodland, I automatically thought of all my old trees and hoped they were all right. With that, the light went out on the radio alarm and I knew that the electricity was now off, St Jude had arrived! The first thing I did when getting up much later, was to go into the woodland and check on all my trees, they seemed fine, thank goodness, just small branches everywhere and a thick carpet of leaves covering everything.
Taking photographs for this month’s Foliage Day was a question of dodging the showers, sometimes they were quite light but at others it was torrential rain. A gradual change is coming over the garden, a more golden tint to the leaves. Some leaves that were changing last month have almost blown away in all the wind we have had, this was the Amelanchier that I showed you last month, the leaves are nearly all gone.
When I first came downstairs this morning and looked out of the kitchen window, there was a wonderful sunrise to greet me.
As with Sussex Prairies, years ago, I had read in various magazines and seen on TV, a house and garden on the Isle of Wight which also had a cottage in the garden which you can rent and also have access to the owners garden and lake, yes lake, too big to be a pond. When we knew we were going to be over that side of the country for the wedding in London, we thought, why not combine it with a week’s break somewhere. I couldn’t remember the name of the house, but after a search on Google soon found it. Haddon Lake House and Garden has won awards for both the house that was built jutting out over the lake and the garden, part of which is a walled garden. The cottage is in a corner of the walled garden and this was the view we had when the door was unlocked in the garden wall, I just knew we were in for a good week.
Having spent about an hour at Nyman’s garden, we then made our way to the garden that I have read about in all the gardening magazines –Sussex Prairies – and have been wanting to visit ever since it was made in 2008.
We have just got back after a week and a bit away. We went to a wedding in London first where our son had the pleasant duty of giving his Mother in Law away, then as we were over in that part of the country, the next day we headed down to Sussex Prairies Garden, stopping at the National Trust garden, Nymans, on the way, this was a surprise to me, I knew nothing about stopping at this one!
The autumn colours were quite evident when we first entered the garden, making a good contrast with the evergreens.
……when I drew the curtains back and saw mist covering the garden, I knew it would be a good day for photographing the spider’s webs in the garden.
Spider’s web in the central bed by the dead oak.
When the curtains are first drawn back in a morning, the light is different, there is a golden glow now which is so different from a couple of weeks ago. The leaves are starting to turn colour and with all the high winds we have been having, they are floating down to cover the grass. Our first tree to change colour is Amelanchier lamarckii.
Autumn berries are ripening up all around us, so far the birds haven’t eaten many, but then, it hasn’t been too cold yet to kill off all the insects which they feed on. Maybe it is too soon to say, but I feel that maybe the heat of our summer has taken its toll on how many berries there are, some plants aren’t showing any berries at all. These first berries are sloes, fruit of the Blackthorn bush, anyone for sloe gin?
