Surrey/Kent/Sussex UK 2018

Surrey/Kent/Sussex Mini Break

We are working on getting the last of our money’s working on our Royal Oak/ National Trust membership, so we’ve come for a long weekend over the MLK holiday.

12-Jan-2018

Land in Heathrow in the wee hours and take the shuttle bus to Alamo rental car (we rented from them last year and since car and customer service were great, we’re back and not at all disappointed).  It is like 6:30 AM and dark, dark, dark.

Drive to first place.  Bodiam Castle, about 75 miles away but we have zero traffic.  We get to the nearby town knowing that we are too early, so we type in “food” into the SATNAV and get a cafe called “Pat – A- Cake, which is now called “Wills”.  Food was good, typical English breakfast.  We shared the breakfast. 2 fried eggs, 2 sausages, 2 rashers of bacon, bread, mushrooms and baked beans.  Apparently, the extra egg was 2.50 pounds.

It was freezing cold, like we were back in the 80s before England got rich again and building interiors are heated hot enough to boil a fox.    Fun tour and watching people feed the ducks in the moat.   No cafe here but nice gift shop.

Drive to (also National Trust) Scotney Castle.  Old castle is closed, but house is open.  House is full of artifacts from 1900 or so, including a letter from Margaret Thatcher (who had been a tenant here) and a photo of Ms. Simpson and prior husband at a family wedding as well as a letter from her to the family (related by marriage) with a veiled reference to Edward.

Lunch at @ Cote, a very nice chain but better for breakfast than other meals.

We’re back at a Premier Inn in Tonbridge, which is quiet and clean with friendly staff and a great value.

13-Jan-2018

Breakfast at the adjacent Ale restaurant.  Get English breakfast, eggs, mushrooms, bubbles & squeak, blood sausage, sausage, yogurt, fruit.

Drive to Wakehurst Place, which is in partnership between Kew Gardens and the National Trust, so admission is free to NT members but the parking is paid).  What an adventure just to get to the parking. Wakehurst is 500 Acres of gardens shaped in a down pointing horse shoe.  Some of the gardens are closed for winter.  The building we visit was the Mansion.

They also have a Millennium Seed bank, which we did not see. The mansion has the 1^st floor open only.  It was smaller compared to other mansions.  Redone in like 1910, it looks it.  The Chapel has stained glass windows and very warm do to the large radiator in the side. We walked down and up a path for a short while, then headed back out.

Next stop is Standen (also NT), which had been on our bucket list forever.  It was designed by a friend of William Morris.  This is the  Arts & Crafts style.  Gardens, beehives, water tower, water storage tanks, lots of activity here. We start in one room, then pass by the sitting room with a fire burning.  Next, the billiard room with a large billiard table.  Go through the sitting room and view all the pottery and fireplace.  We sit for a bit in front of the crackling fire and enjoy albums of old photos of the home and family.  Walk upstairs to see a room dedicated to preservation techniques, as well other furnished rooms.

In the Gong Room under the stairs is a beautiful piano in quarter sawn oak and beautiful tiles.  Into the study, the 30s furniture.  Back to the kitchen where 2 old woman were making lemon cake and ginger cookies.  YUM We have lunch of the cafe, chili and a cream tea.

At 2 PM, we get a tour of the water tower.  The attic is a brown bat haven from May to August.  Up 4 flights stairs, 76 steps, we view the large galvanized tanks filled with sand and gravel.  This was in operation until 1984.  Water is filtered from rain and sent to the house and into underground tanks.

At the top of the tower walk way, we view the wonderful fields and knolls.  This landscape is older than medieval and untouched. Den is where ancient farmers cleared out a space to hold pigs feasting on the forest acorns.  Standen is the  castle next to stone where farmers cleared forests for their pigs.  The tour was great.  Learned a lot. Light dinner from Sainsbury’s in our hotel room.

14-Jan-2018

Most of the day spent at the Watts site in Surrey.  First stop while waiting for everything else to open is the extraordinary Watts Memorial Chapel, which is an Arts & Crafts marvel that can only be described in photos.

The Watts Gallery has works by both of the Watts and other artists, and is one of the repositories for the De Morgan ceramics collection.  We enjoy tea at the café and then tour Limmerslea, the house, which is still in a state of renovation.  There are galleries and shops throughout the village.

We take the car back to Heathrow and go to the Premier Inn Hammersmith.

15-Jan-2018

Breakfast and morning at the V&A and then a walk to the Design Museum for the Ferrari – Under The Skin exhibition.  The museum has no real permanent exhibit, and unlike most museums in London is not free.  Back to Heathrow for flight home.

(see our London page for details and photos)