Castle Combe, The Cotswolds, Wiltshire

Photo’s are here or you can just click on the photograph above.

A great year for catching up with family and friends. A whirlwind trip late April/early May to see family and friends criss-crossing from the Southeast to East Anglia to the Midlands to Northern England and back to the Southeast. Back in June (before a vacation with friends in Italy) and another final few days in July. English country pubs, streams, waterfalls, hiking in the Yorkshire Dales, spring and summer flowers, a night at the theatre and quaint village tea shops. 

We arrived early in London Heathrow and drove, jet-lagged from our overnight flight, straight to my family in Suffolk just in time to shuffle my mother out of her apartment on her walker into the nearest tea shop in Dedham on the Essex/Suffolk border. The Essex Rose is a quintessential cute English tea-shop in the historic village of Dedham on the River Stour famed for its lowland wetland meadows. This is iconic Constable Country. The tea shop is very pretty but the food isn’t as good (for those in the know) as the more modern Suffolk-pink hued Old Bakery Cafe at the other end of the High Street which retains my vote for best coffee and cake in the village. Dedham village is an attractive combination of upscale Georgian houses, wisteria-draped cottages and timber-framed inns. It is one of my favorite villages in the area. Afternoon tea and cake was followed by a surprisingly good curry at Zaynab Indian Cuisine in Capel St Mary with my brother and sister-in-law, Paul and Katie. 

Bright and early the following morning we stretched out our plane-cramped legs on an entirely flat and unchallenging walk through the low-lying wetlands outside Dedham following the route of the River Stour. Kayakers (brave individuals who clearly don’t judge acceptable water temperatures by the temperature of the Gulf of Mexico in July) were launching into the shallow waters of the river under the overhanging tree branches and riverside shrubs weighed low with spring flowers. Cows were grazing on the buttercups in the fields as we strolled by. It was all very bucolic and peaceful until Geoff pointed out that the cows were actually hefty-sized bullocks 😉

Time to return to collect my mother again late morning to drive down to Frinton-on-Sea, Essex for lunch with Geoff’s nan. We took them to Bell Inn Bistro in Thorpe-le-Soken. Traditional English fish and chips all around and the ‘elderlies’ were ready for a very brief stagger along the seafront in a Baltic-cold wind so strong it almost knocked us all off our feet. The sea here is brown and constantly churning and wouldn’t be warm enough for us to dip a toe into even on an unseasonably hot day in August. Given its location on the easternmost coastline of England it will, of course, never have an unseasonably hot day in August 😉 A final dinner with my brother and sister-in-law at The Crown in Stoke-by-Nayland – a gastro pub with a beautiful courtyard garden in a small Suffolk village – and we were off again. 

Early the following morning we left for Melton Mowbray in the Midlands to visit Geoff’s family. Time to squeeze in lunch with his dad and step-mother at a rustic coffee shop/cafe at Eye Kettleby Lakes before joining a few of Geoff’s old school friends on a pub crawl in Melton ending at Spice of India – a curry house not afraid to kick up the spices a notch or two – possibly the hottest tikka masala in the UK! 

On Saturday morning we drove out to Rutland Water with Geoff’s family for a walk around the water. It is a huge reservoir providing water to the East Midlands. There were runners, kids in strollers and walkers enjoying the sunshine. Sheep wandered grazing the grasses and nibbling upon the daisies and all would have been well if it weren’t for the two billion irritating flies which accompanied us as we circumnavigated the water. Luckily they weren’t biting but a cork-strung Aussie Outback hat might have come in useful. 

We drove to Whitwell for lunch in a country pub. The Noel at Whitwell village wasn’t quite as pleasant as the reviews suggested. The food was okay but the interior and the ambience were decidedly lacking. Still, nothing that couldn’t be remedied by a mango cheesecake ice-cream sitting in the late-spring sunshine at Ferneley’s excellent Dairy Barn Cafe in the countryside outside Melton. 

The social event of the trip to Melton was Geoff’s second school reunion on Saturday night with his now similarly aged and wrinkly high school mates. I left him in The Harboro Hotel mid-evening since I couldn’t add much to their reminiscences of various loved and loathed school teachers nor to the teenage antics and misdeeds of Geoff and his classmates. It must have been a good night since he didn’t drag himself home until the wee hours after dancing the night away in a local nightclub.

I was surprised he was fit enough to make it to the family Sunday lunch “the day after the night before” but he has a far stronger constitution to party until the early hours than I do 😉 Lunch was supposed to be at his father’s “favorite pub”. There had been a slight breakdown in communication between family members prior to booking the alleged favorite pub. The name of the “favorite pub” (and indeed the village of its location) were, for reasons which are still unclear, completely confused with another pub in an entirely different village. This was very fortuitous! The pub which his father had never heard of (let alone been to) was extremely good. If you’re ever in the area check out The Crown Inn, Old Dalby. The food was absolutely excellent, the pub garden was very pretty and Geoff’s father now has a new favorite pub!

Time to head a couple of hours north to Harrogate to visit my best friend from University and her family for the week. We love Harrogate, the Yorkshire Dales and our friends. It would be fun to visit them even if we were knee-deep in snow and sleet but, as luck would have it, the weather turned out far better than predicted in the chilly north! The blossom on the cherry trees lining the pathways across The Stray in Harrogate was glowing candy-floss pink and, as the daffodils were starting to fade, the tulips in the pristinely-maintained gardens of the mansion houses lining the park were stunning. Harrogate was as beautiful as ever.

Come rain or shine our first planned destination in the Dales was Cray Gill waterfalls in Upper Wharfedale. No trip to Yorkshire starts without a visit to my favorite tea shop in the world – The Old School Tea Room – in the pretty village of Hebden. The converted school house with its views over the rolling hills dotted with distant patches of wild daffodils in early May is picture-perfect. The food is fabulous and whoever bakes their cakes deserves a Michelin star 😉 Understandably it is very popular with hikers. I could spend all morning there frittering time and expanding my waistline.

Post-coffee and cake we drove 30 minutes north to Buckden car park where we were to start our hike to Cray Gill waterfalls. Things didn’t go quite according to plan. Some way around the hike Caroline’s husband Stephen decided to retrace his steps back to the car in Buckden. The plan was to meet him back there in a few hours at which point we would all drive together to the White Lion in the village of Cray for our lunch reservation. The three of us continued onwards up hill, past streams and lower waterfalls, and down dale until we reached the village of Cray which was the start of the area with the larger waterfalls. By the time we arrived in Cray we were running very short on time (probably due to my lingering too long over coffee and cake at The Old School Tea Room at the start of the day). We wouldn’t be able to make it all the way to the upper waterfalls, complete the circular walk back to the carpark in Buckden to meet Stephen and drive back to Cray to make our reservation time at the White Lion – let alone make last orders before the kitchen closed. Oops … I think that might have been my fault 😉

Since we were standing outside the White Lion salivating we made an executive decision to stay at the pub and continue on to the upper waterfall after lunch. No problem! We would just call Stephen to inform him of our change of plan and have him drive directly to the White Lion and meet us there. Great plan but there is no cellphone signal in Upper Wharfedale whatsoever! Even the owner of the pub didn’t seem to be connected in any way to the 21st century. Once we’d dillied and dallied wasting valuable time trying to make contact with a non-existent cellphone tower we had no alternative but to take a quicker cut-through from Cray back to Buckden. In our haste to find the fastest hiking route possible, we missed the pathway (thanks to the AllTrails app) and soon found ourselves clambering vertically up the side of a very steep grassy hill more used to seeing sheep hooves than human feet. Huffing and puffing and shedding layers of clothing as we ascended, we finally made it to the top and all but ran downhill towards Buckden carpark in the distance. Just before the car park came into view, we finally found a cellphone signal. Whilst we were sweating and heaving for breath Stephen was relaxing with a pint with his feet up in the village pub. No time for that! Lunch was calling. 

The White Lion is very good, every bit worth the effort for anyone in the area. It was sufficiently rustic to be an authentic Yorkshire country pub and the chef was excellent. After lunch and a couple of pints we weren’t quite as fit as we had hoped to continue up dale to the upper falls. So we bailed on hiking and drove instead. Great day but lesson learnt for Caroline and Stephen. If you have lunch booked at a pub in the middle of nowhere, unconnected in any meaningful way to our 21st century world, it’s best not to take me to the Old School Tea Room first 😉 

I spent a cloudy, overcast day alone in the medieval city of York while Geoff and Caroline worked from home. The wind was so cold when I arrived by train from Harrogate that I had to bring forward my traditional late morning coffee and cake stop to 10am for fear that I would otherwise die of hypothermia if I lingered outside for too long. Thankfully, Partisan in Micklegate (a quaint independent coffee shop and cafe) was open so I spent an hour over “second breakfast” and coffee in the hope that the howling gale would have subsided by the time I finished and left the warmth of its four walls. Excellent food, good coffee but absolutely dreadful art hanging on the walls. Whilst Partisan describes itself as an “arts space”, I think it might benefit from sticking to what it is very good at … food … 

My focus for the day was visiting the Shambles, the oldest street in York dating back to the 1300’s. The timber buildings in this very narrow street were originally butchers shops. Unless you get up at 5am to experience the Shambles alone with all of its historical architectural charms you can be sure you’re going to share it with 2000 excited teenagers wielding selfie sticks and at least 300 equally excited, foreign tour bus day visitors.

I walked the section of the York City Walls between Monkbar and Bootham Bar which affords beautiful views of York Minster and passes elegant historical properties with superbly designed gardens. The shops and the architecture, particularly in Stonegate, are lovely. There are breathtaking timber-framed 14th century and 15th century structures. York has a history pre-dating the arrival of the Roman Emperors, it has seen marauding Vikings, the Norman Conquest and it’s been conquered by William. What, I wonder, would Emperor Septimius Severus or vanquishing Viking Ivar the Boneless have made of the 21st century marauding gangs of instagrammers with their selfie sticks taking off the heads of unsuspecting passersby? I cannot imagine.

Somewhat escaping the crowds I meandered to Crumbs Cupcakery just off Minster Yard. I’m not sure why since I’m not a particular fan of cupcakes but it was very pleasant to sit outside, with the white blossom from the cherry trees fluttering in the breeze, sipping Earl Grey with a view of the famous Minster. The cupcake, for future reference, was less than memorable.

The following day Caroline, Geoff and I aimed for Nidderdale. The critical pre-hike coffee and cake stop was at the rustic stone barn Toft Barn Cafe in Bewerley at the top of a windy dale a few miles outside Pateley Bridge. Geoffrey finally found his rightful place in the “naughty corner” of the barn and Caroline and I ate inexcusable quantities of sugary calories to steel us for the hike. We started the hike at Glasshouses and walked along the River Nidd. That section wasn’t particularly inspiring and, with hindsight, we’d have been as well parking in Pateley Bridge, crossing the river and heading uphill into the countryside. It was a lovely walk through the high fields, past drystone walls and barns, not very challenging as far as hikes in the Dales go … and the sun shone. Best of all, since Caroline’s favorite coffee shop in Pateley Bridge was closed, I managed to talk my walking buddies into a second trip to The Old School Tearoom in Hebden for lunch! Lucky me 😊

Our last full day in the Dales was spent at a more sedate pace following the shady path along Hollybank Lane through the bluebell woods in Ripley with our friends and their daughter, Olivia. The bluebells were in full blue blooming glory. Emerging from the woods, we turned left off the paved road and followed a bridlepath with high hedges either side filled with wildflowers. Under foot the pathway was splattered with freshly deposited horse manure. I was rather hoping we wouldn’t meet a horse coming in the opposite direction since the pathway was barely wide enough for a single human let alone a 5 foot horse, a rider and a hiker. We popped out of the bridleway and over a bridge into the posh village of Hempsthwaite – destination Sophies’s Coffee Shop for her excellent coffee and cakes. 

For dinner on our final evening the four of us drove out to a country gastro pub in the village of Minskip. The white-painted Wild Swan was surprisingly quiet given the excellent quality of its food. It has a comfortable minimalist feel rather than the more rustic traditional Yorkshire country pub. Loved it!

With heavy hearts we left Yorkshire and our old friends and drove south for our last afternoon in England in the picturesquely posh riverside town of 12th century Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire. Henley is famous for its annual Royal Regatta – the most prestigious rowing race in the world and a highlight of the summer social calendar if you happen to move in those circles. We strolled the river bank at Thamesside pathway and far from bumping into any royalty (they were all up in London preparing for the Coronation of King Charles the following morning), instead we saw Big Duck Lily! Lily is a giant inflatable yellow rubber duck which bobs about in the River Thames at Henley (for reasons I cannot quite fathom). We had booked into Hotel du Vin which is a smart, trendy hotel chain. In Henley the rooms of Hotel du Vin are set around a courtyard and the hotel is in a converted brewery. It looks upmarket and modern but the beds were like bricks and there wasn’t a great deal of privacy nor peace and quiet if you had a courtyard room. Still, we would have been better eating dinner there (since breakfast the following morning was very good). Instead I had made the fatal error of booking a table for dinner at Bistro at the Boathouse. With hindsight I have no idea what possessed me. I could have sworn I had read that it had great reviews and was a well-known institution in Henley particularly given its attractive riverside location. However, it was dreadful. I would hazard a guess that everything we ordered had just been defrosted, microwaved, and/or poured out of a box and was fresh off the back of a Sysco truck. Never again. 

It could have been a very inauspicious gastronomic end to our late spring tour around the tea shops, gastro pubs and curry houses of England but since we were flying home on 6th May we ate like royalty whilst sipping pink champagne in the first class lounge at Heathrow airport watching the Coronation of our new King on TV 😊

Back again across the Atlantic 5 weeks later in mid-June to catch up with family in West Sussex and visit friends in Kent for 5 or 6 days before heading to Italy on vacation. 

The flight to London Heathrow arrived on time on a beautiful summer’s evening. We passed straight through immigration and an hour later were driving the narrow country lanes through West Sussex, in the heart of the South Downs National Park. We checked in to the White Horse Inn, in the tiny village of Sutton. It is a very pretty Grade II listed, 18th century country pub which we wouldn’t hesitate to use as a base again. The kitchen had already closed for dinner but all was not lost. The proprietor of the Inn called his friend at a neighboring pub and a few minutes later Geoff had placed his order for fish and chips and was supping a pint of local ale a couple of miles down the road at the equally quaint The Badgers at Coultershaw Bridge.

The following morning after an enormous breakfast at the White Horse Inn we drove a few miles to the sedately upmarket market town of Petworth, famous for its antique stores and small independent stores and cafes. It was worth an early morning wander and if we could have squeezed in coffee and cake at one of the tea shops we would have – but we were booked in for lunch back at the White Horse Inn with Geoff’s two sisters and niece. Lunch wasn’t quite as exciting as breakfast had been so next time I might book elsewhere. The area isn’t short of cute country pubs for lunch. 

Late afternoon we arrived in Birling, Kent ( the english county known affectionately as “The Garden of England”) to visit friends, Dave and Ali. A heatwave was sweeping across the UK, as it so often does in June. Whilst the lack of air conditioning in general in England would make the average AC-dependent American tourist wilt, who’s going to complain about sunshine and blue skies in England when you’re on vacation? There is nothing more quintessentially english than sipping a glass of wine watching Painted Lady butterflies flutter past on a summer’s breeze and furry, fat Bumblebees, heavy with pollen, maneuvering from one fragrant rose to the next amongst the flower borders. 

The following morning we all took a walk across the cornfields towards the Downs before the temperatures got too unseasonably steamy. Dave and Geoff squeezed in a round of golf at Dave’s local club, London Golf Club in Ash and Ali and I wandered into the neighboring attractive market town of West Malling. The Hungry Guest cafe and food shop is an excellent place to stock up on artisanal homemade supplies. We walked through town down to the ponds at Manor Park Country Park where a family of newly hatched ducklings were paddling furiously trying to keep up with mummy Mallard. A few feet from the shore, a beautiful white swan was grooming her new family of fluffy grey cygnets.

Ali and I took a day trip the following day to Canterbury famous for its Cathedral, St Augustine’s Abbey, Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales and its well-preserved medieval buildings. The city has been of critical historical significance for Christian pilgrims since the assassination of Archbishop Thomas Becket in 1170. 

953 years later the city is less the centre of tumultuous religious and political strife and more a peaceful university town where mothers and young children picnic on the grass at the riverside in Westgate Gardens and boaters propel wooden punts along the River Stour followed by families of ducks paddling in their wake. The punts leave from Westgate Bridge under the shadow of Westgate, the last remaining 14th century medieval city gate, and pass through the flower-filled formal gardens. Some of the most spectacular buildings are Christ Church Gate in Buttermarket (the entrance to the Cathedral); The Tudor timber-framed The Old Weaver’s House built in 1500; the 17th century Crooked House; and the Beaney House of Art and Knowledge.

We had booked lunch at The Goods Shed – a farmers market, restaurant and foodhall with upmarket artisanal food vendors in a converted warehouse building. It is a few minutes walk from the main center of the town and is a destination spot for all visitors looking for high quality locally-sourced food. We passed on dessert because our next destination was the delightful village of Chilham and I knew there was a high chance we’d stop for afternoon tea at The Church Mouse tea shop 😉 Chilham is a very small quiet medieval village with steep, narrow lanes and a central square. Many of the buildings are timber-framed Tudor, there is a 16th century church and it even boasts its own castle.

The highlight of the trip to Kent, however, was an evening at Bromley Little Theatre watching our friend Dave play Jack Nicholson’s role (Colonel Nathan R Jessup) in ‘A Few Good Men’. We’ve seen Dave acting before so it wasn’t a surprise that it would be a high quality production. The theatre was tiny but the performances were huge 😊 

The following morning we returned to Heathrow Airport, London to collect our very jet-lagged American friends Don and Sue from their night flight and forced them to stay awake for the day! We were spending the night in the posh Georgian riverfront town of Marlow. Marlow is in the Thames River Valley and is backed by the rolling Chiltern Hills. Its most famous landmark is its white-painted suspension bridge built in 1829 spanning the River Thames. We dragged them from pillar to post trying to keep them conscious to beat the worst of the jet lag. We drove out to the small village of West Wycombe (mainly owned by the National Trust due to its historically significant buildings) and took them to the Apple Orchard Coffee shop for lunch and homemade cakes. Back to Marlow for a riverfront stroll which culminated in drinks at the Compleat Angler, a luxury hotel on the waterfront in Marlow with sweeping lawns and views over the River Thames and the Marlow Weir.

A few years ago before we left for a previous vacation to Italy with Don and Sue, we ate at the historic Michelin Star restaurant at The Hind’s Head (of chef Heston Blumenthal fame) in the picturesque village of Bray, Berkshire. This year we ate at the 16th century pub, The Crown at Bray, previously owned by Blumenthal but recently sold to similarly well-known restauranteurs. Don proclaimed the pub served the “Best British Pint in England”! I’m not sure he’s entirely qualified to make such a claim since he’s only set foot on British soil twice in his 73 years … but Geoff didn’t disagree … it was “Timothy Taylor’s Landlord” pale ale after all 😉

We had a few hours to kill the following day before our late afternoon flight to Brindisi, Puglia, Italy so I insisted upon a second breakfast stop at Crocus Cafe at Dorney Court, Dorney, Buckinghamshire for what is, in reality, the “Best Bakewell Tart in England”. Unlike Don, I am infinitely better placed to make such a claim after extensive years of in-depth research on the subject 😊 

Awash with coffee and tart we still had time for a stroll through Eton High Street, across famous Windsor Bridge and along the riverfront before heading to the airport … next stop … la bella Italia!

A couple of weeks later in July, tanned by the Italian sun and filled with gelato, we arrived back in England, bade farewell to Don and Sue and drove east to Suffolk for the final installment in England. We stayed with my brother and sister-in-law, Paul and Katie, and arrived just in time for dinner at an unpretentious country pub called Queens Head in the village of Great Wenham which curiously specializes in curries. Curries are not, by any standard, normal fare for a country village pub and the landlord and his wife are neither Indian, Pakistani nor Bangladeshi which makes their choice of specializing in curries even more unusual. For curry aficionados, however, we had to admit that it was surprisingly good!

We bundled up my 87 year old mum and took her for morning coffee and cake to Essex Rose Tea Room, Dedham and for a very slow wander through the pretty village to the Arts and Crafts Centre. Then off to Snape Maltings in the Suffolk coastal countryside close to Aldeburgh with my brother and sister-in-law. The Maltings are a collection of boutique stores, cafes and art galleries in repurposed buildings once used in brewing beer. The complex sits on the Alde Estuary. It is a well-known destination for visitors to the area and hosts music festivals throughout the summer. Quick lunch and a wander through the estuary walkways and then off to Aldeburgh for a spot of clothes shopping and a bag of fish and chips overlooking the pebble beach – a compulsory end to any day trip to this well-known Suffolk coastal town.

Down to the last few days in England, we were on the final push to see as many of our relatives as possible so we detoured to Geoff’s nan for a surprisingly good lunch in Frinton-on-Sea, Essex at Parker’s Garden Company. We tried, in vain (again), to walk along the seafront but the usual freezing gale force winds were blowing and the gloomy brown seas of the East Anglian coast were still churning. 

Whilst I am not the greatest fan of the East Anglian coast, I do love the Suffolk countryside and especially the town of Lavenham. A medieval town built on the profits from the wool industry, it is an architectural gem of timber-framed Tudor buildings with a 15th century Guild Hall and an even older market cross. Such beauty hasn’t gone unnoticed by tourists over the years, and where tourists wander, there will also be a plethora of excellent tea shops to feed them. The most excellent of them all in this town is Lavenham Blue Vintage Tea Shop – lacy paper doilies, mismatched bone china tea cups and plates and single-stem roses in crystal vases. The lemon curd cake with lemon sorbet was exemplary but the star of the show was the coffee and walnut cake with affogato ice-cream which was other-worldly. It is impossible to visit Suffolk without visiting Lavenham Blue!

Our final night with Paul and Katie was a blowout gastro pub meal at Sun Inn, Dedham where my sister-in-law ordered an appetizer of lamb’s sweetbreads without realizing what they actually were. We watched on in horror as she chewed through them (and not only because we don’t eat meat). Even after my brother rather unsportingly enlightened her she valiantly made her way through them all. She’s a braver woman than I 😉. My favorite gastro pub in the area – the Sun Inn is an old coaching inn with dark, uneven wooden floors, meandering rooms, oak panelling and a top-notch chef. 

One final stop and one more relative! My favorite part of England is The Cotswolds, a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in the central southwest England. It is a region of quintessentially English villages and small market towns characterized by thatched roofs, honey-coloured oolitic Jurassic limestone houses, clambering roses and wisteria draped over doorways. The Cotswolds covers an area of 800 square miles of rolling hills and pristine streams. Tiny Castle Combe village in Wiltshire is one of the few famous villages we have not yet visited so we took advantage of the opportunity to spend the night at Castle Inn in Castle Combe. The village is frequently hailed as England’s prettiest. It has a market cross, a couple of pubs, a 13th century church, a very posh hotel called The Manor House (which is always booked out during the summer with weddings) and, most famously of all, a narrow stone bridge over the Bybrook River. The view towards the village from the bridge is very possibly the most photographed and instagrammed location in the entire region. Many famous movies have been filmed here (Dr Dolittle, War Horse and The Wolfman amongst others ) because it is one of those rare locations where there are no street lights nor TV aerials. Its internet and cellphone service are all but non-existent too which isn’t quite as appealing.

The Castle Inn is a lovely historic building. We stayed in an atmospheric room overlooking the market cross with a bed so high that anyone shorter than 5’7″ might need a small step ladder to clamber up into it. Breakfast was excellent and dinner the evening before was equally good. Coincidentally, Geoff’s aunt Val also lives in The Cotswolds so she drove out to meet us at the inn for dinner for our last night. 

After 3 visits to England in May, June and July we had finally managed to catch up with all of our family and some of our oldest friends. We saw the best of spring with daffodils, bluebells, purple wisteria and cherry blossoms and the best of early summer with roses blooming and newborn cygnets and ducklings. We’re both 10 pounds heavier courtesy of all of the visits to traditional english tea shops and fabulous country gastro pubs but who cares?!

I love my motherland ❤️