My Average Holidays

What a busy month! The weather at the beginning and end was glorious for April and probably means the rest of the year will be horrid but we definitely made the most of it while the sun shone.

Our first National Trust day trip was a double header of Buckland Abbey and then in the afternoon Cotehele. You could spend the whole day at each of these but we like to maximise our days out. When looking for a location we always see if there’s anything else nearby and there nearly always is.

However to increase our chances of visiting more than one place we’re now English Heritage members! We managed to find a 25% discount code on Lyns ‘work offers’ so a years membership for both of us was just £108. English Heritage do seem more likely to offer discounts, for example the Blue Light Card (a discount card for serving and retired members of the NHS and emergency services in the UK) offers a 20% discount. Like the National Trust this gives you entry and car parking for free as many times as you like. Without a membership you’re looking at £15-20 per adult to get in to most of these places plus parking so it won’t take long to be quids in.

Both of these are worth a visit but I think Cotehele was my favourite. It was also at Cotehele that the ladies in the shop informed Lyn about the National Trust Passport and the pins. You can get the passport stamped whenever you go to a property and once you’ve filled it you get a prize or something. The pins are actually nice and unique to each property. I think it’s supposed to be for kids but it’s a good bit of fun and Lyn loves this sort of thing. If you search for this it’s just a lot of people saying “Did you know about this?” National Trust are absolutely rubbish at promoting this sort of thing and their website is shocking.

While at Cotehele I liked the gardens and appreciated the downhillness (not a word) of the walk to the river and a cafe where we stopped and had a pasty. We made our way to the watermill and had an ANZAC biscuit that some lady was making in the mill and then got the van back up to our car and drove home. It was a really nice day.

A couple of days later as the sun was still shining we decided to go to Arlington Court. This is our closest National Trust property and the last time we went was during Covid so it was a bit shit. As we now had to collect pins and stamps we got a Supermarket Meal Deal and drove over. I appreciate this is a very old person thing to do but grabbing a supermarket sandwich and sitting on a bench in the garden of a stately home in the sun is very pleasurable. God I’m old! The only slight annoyance was that Lyn managed to loose her Arlington Court pin. Fortunately she recognised that one of the people in the shop use to be Matthews teacher… ” I remember Matthew!” she said “lots of energy… but in a good way” she added a little too slow. She replaced the pin for free.

Our ‘pre-planned’ event for April was to go to Dunster Castle for an evening of Medieval Music (I know you’re all very jelly). While Lyn has been to Dunster before I had not so we decided to make a day of it. Dunster castle is impressive, it was owned and occupied by the same family for 600 years until the 1970s when they gave it to the National Trust.

We arrived when it opened and Lyn immediately lost her Arlington Court pin again. I’ve decided to get her a sash like the girl guides have. We got suckered in to spending £3 each on a tour of the kitchens. These are the old kitchens not open to the public and having been on the tour I can see why. Save your money. We looked around the castle and then walked down the loverly gardens which were all starting to blossom and went to the Water Mill. Lyn didn’t want a pin from here as it was just a flour sack. The chap in the shop however did big up the stamp and I must say it is impressive. I’m not going to show it here, you’ll have to go yourself.

The medieval music was based around the Luttrell Psalter. A Psalter is just a book of psalms and not as I thought something to do with condiments. A psalm is a religious song or poem. Basically it’s a medieval version of NME. They had a copy of the psalter laid out on a cushion for people to look at. Lyn decided to have a flick through it and before I could say “I don’t think you should be doing that?” One of the musicians came running over shouting “Don’t touch it!”. He didn’t tackle her to the floor but it was a close run thing. Lyn came back over to me and an archivist from the National Trust who I’d been talking to and said ‘Well it should have had a sign on it’. Another one of the musicians then came over and gave Lyn a personal tour of the book. Despite it being a copy it’s still allegedly worth two grand.

April has been lovely. Matthew and I have started our golfing again, we’ve all sorted our outfits for the wedding in a couple of months and Victoria passed an interview for the NHS and will start a new job and career in the Autumn. Touch wood everyone seems happy and long may it continue.