Good morning, Monday!
At least this week we’re not at work, so we get to choose what we are going to do with the day. What Jools decided was that we should visit a bead shop. Not only that, it meant being so close to Shaftesbury, which means Gold Hill.
Gold Hill is famous for being the setting for a famous TV advert for Hovis Bread. The voiceover was in a thick Yorkshire accent, yet the location was deepest Dorset. And gold Hill is a steep cobbled street with a rows of cottages on one side, each one towering over it’s neighbour.
We drive taking narrow lanes that the sat nav has selected. I stop to snap a couple of churches. Which means I am happy too. At Semley, I spotted an unusual marker in the churchyard, only to see it is of PC Yvonne Fletcher, who was gunned down outside the Libyan Embassy in the 1980s. He killer has never been brought to justice, and was even allowed to leave Britain under the cloak of diplomatic immunity. There is a fine stained glass window in the church to her memory, and in the visitor’s book I see many Met PCs have come to pay their respects. I pay mine and shed a tear. Her family live in the village to this day, and so must bear this atrocity every day.
In Shaftesbury, we visit the parish church, grab a coffee and visit Gold Hill because its there!
From here we thought of going to East Knoyle to a country pub for lunch. On the way we spot a sign pointing to Stourhead; was it that close? It would be glorious in the autumn, even on a cloudy day. It’s set then, off to Stourhead, lunch in the Spread Eagle and a walk round the park!
We grab a table in the Spread Eagle overlooking the lake, Jools orders fish pie and I have cheese and ham ploughman’s. It is a such a pleasant place, we both have crème brulee to round the meal off. After that we needed the long walk around the lake to work those calories off. It is dull and drizzly, but the autumn colours are reflected perfectly in the lake as there is barely a breath of wind to disturb the surface.
As the complete the circuit, the weather closes in, and the light begins to fade despite it not being three in the afternoon again. We head back to the car and then begin the drive back to the cabin. On the way we receive a message that Nan is not well. Worse than that, she is very ill indeed. She has had a heart attack and is in hospital clinging on to life. She is 99, and now quite frail. But I thought she was going to make it into triple figures. And she may do yet, but it was only that the paramedics that were in the house today that she survived. And so, we now wait for news.
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