No idea how Ruth found out about this garden but she booked tickets at the beginning of April for one of its Open Days. It’s a 70-acre garden and arboretum privately owned by Michael Heseltine and his wife, but open to the public on selected dates throughout the year.
At the time she booked, I just heard ‘Oxfordshire’, assumed it wouldn’t be too long a drive and resolved to check the location later. In fact it was over an hour’s drive as it’s up near Banbury, off junction 11 of the M40 and a turning off the A422 near Farthinghoe. We did manage to take the route they recommend into Thenford, through Middleton Cheney, and not the one that Google Maps tried to take me, up a single track road (the horror).
The Heseltines have owned the house and garden since the mid-1970s and have evidently overseen an orgy of restoration and new planting and landscaping. We had a pleasant walk around over a couple of hours, with a stop for tea and cake in the middle. Posting photos on the internet is apparently discouraged, so I’ve restricted myself to a few views of things already shown on their website.
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| Me with the Minotaur |
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| The walled garden |
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| The Rill |
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| One of the medieval fish ponds |
We returned to the visitor area at the end of our visit, me to use the toilets and Ruth to ask a question of the book/postcard lady about the medieval fish ponds. As we came back through the tea room, Lord H was standing in the tea area speaking to punters. We feebly chickened out of speaking to him, though we had been a bit intrigued to ask about the massive bust of Lenin in his sculpture garden.
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| The massive Lenin |
By one of the medieval fish ponds we saw a darling little baby moorhen (or poss coot) running down the bank into the water after its mother. This made me think that I've missed out on seeing many adorably tiny baby waterfowl this year. Have I just missed them? There are generally loads of goslings near the Thames at Christchurch Meadows. Hopefully it's just that I've been unobservant or not there at the right time rather than there having been a gosling drought this year.
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