The Ham Nomads

13 Sep 2014. <GB-ENG> Charlecote, Wellesbourne, Warw —

Well, here we go with another double header.

Saturday could have been a nothing day, as basically all we want to do right now is to get back to Gloucester to get the van serviced — we're not sure if we test the van too far, it will come through for us. So we looked at a plan to get us back — and Stratford-upon-Avon looked like a good intermediate point. But then Warren noticed Charlecote Park, a National Trust property not far from Stratford, so we gravitated there.

To sum up, we went to Charlecote Park, a manor that has been in the hands of the Lucy family since William the Conqueror. Had a wonderful time there, took many photos, went back to the van, parked less than 2 miles away, downloaded the photos — and found that most of them were corrupt. Memory card issues. Anyway, decided to save what we could, reformat the card, then go back the next morning (it's National Trust, so costs us nothing to get in) and redo the photos. So that's what we did!

Charlecote Park was offered to the National Trust in 1946 on the condition that the family could continue to reside on most of the upstairs rooms, and have access to the 'public' rooms whenever they want to run a function. The Trust wasn't too keen until the Lucys reminded them that William Shakespeare in his youth had come up before Sir Thomas Lucy I in about 1583 for poaching deer from the Lucy estates — and Will later took his revenge by portraying Sir Thomas as the fussy Justice Shallow in The Marry Wives of Windsor. The trust took it over, and now has all the costs of upkeep! (A good bargain for the Lucys — but not that the Trust is complaining — Charlecote Park runs at a handsome profit.

The grounds open at 10.30am, the House at 11. Not that you lack something to do if you get there early — there's a huge plant and produce market set up right by the visitor's Centre, and it was doing a roaring trade while we waited.

This place is rather incredible. You get into the grounds and walk up this long gravel entrance path up to the gatehouse and then through to the house. There has been a dwelling here since the 11th century, but what you see now is basically Victorian in date (but Elizabethan revival in style), but parts of the buildings actually date back to Elizabethan times. The Elizabethan Revival touches are mainly the work of Mary Elizabeth Lucy in the 1820s and 1830s. The grounds were laid out by Capability Brown in the 1750s and 1760s. Queen Elizabeth herself visited here in 1572.

On both days we went first to the Orangerie, which is now a restaurant, for scones and coffee to start the day. Then we went round the place. In the old stables there is a superb collection if Victorian carriages, ranging from a simple Breaking Cart through a Phaeton, a Brougham, an American buggy, right up to a Victoria and an actual coach (used for family weddings) — and there was even a coffin bier to round out the collection. We were shown over it by a guide who really knew his stuff!

We went into the working Victorian kitchen — on the Sunday there was even a chef firing up the huge stove, intending to bake bread that day. There is a huge cabinet in there that somewhat overwhelmed Susie for sheer size!

We went through the laundry — not functioning, but there are plans to get it going again — and the brewhouse — unfortunately, no plans to revive this one!

Into the house itself. It looks Elizabethan, but is not. The magnificent timber ceiling in the Great Hall is not — it's just plaster, but painted so expertly you are convinced it really is wood! There are paintings of the Lucys going way back, and if there's no painting, there are plaster reproductions of the busts from their tombs or sometimes real marble busts, all exhibited in the Great Hall. There's even a bust of Queen Elizabeth I. Also in the Great Hall there's a wonderful table made of marble and semi-precious stones, absolutely superb, and not to be dealt with lightly — it weighs over 2 tonnes! The floor in the Great Hall was replaced when the Lucys returned from a continental tour and brought back a new floor of red and white marble from Venice — the old flagstones went into the large kitchen.

Billiard Room

Drawing Room

Won't go through the house in detail, but the four most magnificent rooms are the Great Hall, the Library, the Dining Room and the Billiard Room. The plaster ceilings in these are all different, and all totally over the top! All the furniture belonged to the Lucys, so we see the house as it was actually lived in. The Lucys were keen booklovers, and the library reflects their rather eclectic tastes — although a whole case of the Racing Calendar for virtually the whole 19th century has us a little worried. They also hosted musical performances on a regular basis, and the Drawing Room would have been a magnificent venue for these.

On the Saturday, we took a guided garden tour which gave us a greater appreciation of the challenges of maintaining such a magnificent estate. Did we mention that, since Tudor times, there has been a herd of deer on the estate, kept on the grounds by a specially-designed wooden fence that an animal without binocular vision cannot negotiate? There's also a flock of Jacob Sheep, introduced into England by the Lucys in 1756.

On the Sunday we had the added bonus of a group of English Country Dancers performing in the Cedar Lawn outside the Orangerie.

Distance driven — today, 12 miles ( 19 km ); to date, 7,522 miles ( 12,106 km )