The Knot garden at the Old Palace at Hatfield House is the work of the redoubtable Dowager Marchioness of Salisbury who died, aged 94, in 2016. The fiery daughter of the Earl of Dunraven and Mount Earl in County Limerick in Ireland, she married int the Cecil family in 1945 becoming Marchioness of Salisbury in …
Breakfast at Kenwood
Welcome to our new Walks on Hampstead Heath blog. Dedicated to our walks on the heath but also to gardens (both mine and others) and with the occasional guest appearance from Boris and Arwen – seen here fraternising on our scaffolding balcony. When I moved to Highgate back in February, one of the treats I …
More slow watching…..
As you will have gathered, the last few days have been a bit hectic, what with the launch of the new FreeFrom Food Awards website and the opening of the 2021 awards. (I am delighted to say that we had had eight entries by the end of day one!) So I fear that I have …
Slow walk around the boating pond
A reader told me the other day how much she enjoyed my/our walks – which caused me to have a little think about them. And I realised that my standard procedure was to march you, relatively briskly, through the woods and over the open heath focusing on the trees, the grasses, the undergrowth and the …
Walking, walking, walking….
I realise that, between this and that, I have not taken you for a walk for quite a long time, so, to make up, here are three of my favourite short walks. Walk 1. Down my ‘private path’ down past Athlone House gardens onto the heathland which runs between me in Highgate and Kenwood House. …
Bark fest
I am delighted to say that I have a fellow-finder-of-faces in trees – who has just sent me this image of wise old tree in (I am pretty sure) Primrose Hill. And to accompany it, this wonderful knobble nurturing new growth. Which made me have a quick look in my image store to see what …