27 Sep 2014. <GB-ENG> Stourton, Wilts —
Started the day at Macca's — not blogging, but finally getting Susie's new computer up and running.
We then drove out to
Stourton and the nearby estate
Stourhead. This place surprised us. It's a National Trust site (although the Hoare family still has a presence). By the time we got there, some time after 12, the place was alive. There is parking available for over a thousand vehicles, and that's roughly what was there!
We went in, and up to the House, which we went through, marvelling at what we saw. The house itself is a copy of an Italian villa designed by the renaissance architect Andrea Palladio — from whom we get the architectural style "Palladian". It contains an amazing Regency library, a Salon filled with Chippendale furniture, paintings that would be the envy of the British Museum, and a cabinet, made for Pope Sixtus V, that just has to be seen to be believed.
But that's not the most amazing thing about Stourhead. The gardens are just breath-taking. Designed by
Henry Flitcoft in the 1740s, they use the natural valley of the
River Stour to create a stunning landscape. There are classical temples, bridges, all set around a superb lake, and designed to reveal themselves piece-by-piece as you stroll around the lake (preferably in an anticlockwise direction). There is a grotto, containing statues of a nymph and of Poseidon. There is a Pantheon, a quarter-scale copy of the Pantheon in Rome, there is a Temple of Apollo, a Temple of Flora — it just goes on! And there are swans in the lake, just to add a little more theatre. Altogether, a most stunning classical landscape garden! We're lucky to be here for indian summer autumn days — we have the balmy weather, and the magnificence of the autumn tonings in the trees, all reflecting in the waters of the lake!
We wandered the gardens for quite a while, and it was getting on past 5pm. We decided we had not yet done the place justice, so elected to continue tomorrow. Luckily, the Trust allows overnight parking — for a £10 fee — so that's just what we did!
Distance driven — today, 20 miles ( 32 km ); to date, 8,054 miles ( 12,962 km )
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