Monday, 8th May, 2023
You will be relieved to know that there is a McDonald's in Cambridge
so we went there for breakfast. The cost was £13.86 which is far
less than anywhere else we have found which provides breakfast.
We then made our way to the Holiday Inn Express where we collected
James and Caroline enroute to Wimpole Estate. The
estate includes Wimpole Hall (an impressive mansion which is the
largest house in Cambrideshire), parkland, gardens and a rare breed
farm. We began our visit at the rare breed farm.
Part of the stables
I had not seen fallen trees treated in this manner before!
Oxford Sandy and
Black + Berkshire Cross
Porkers botn 11th/16th January
Gloucester Old Spot
Gilt
A Shire horse
(named Queenie)
A Shire horse (named Joseph, offspring of Queenie)
These fowers are "Allium Gladiator".
The front of Wimpole Hall
The Entrance Hall
The Grand Staircase
The Yellow Drawing Room was created in 1793 by combining seven
other rooms.
The curved couches were made especially for the room .
The Long Gallery
The Book Room
The ceiling of the Book Room
The ceiling of the Library
The Long Gallery
Detail of above
The South Drawing Room
A rosewood writing table with a "trompe l'oeil"
painting of cards, coins and documents (including a volume of
sonatas and songs by Charpentier)
The Breakfast Room
The Grand Dining Room
Looking up from the bottom of thre staircase.
A painting of paintings - we were told that all except two
have been identified as real paintings.
The Bath House was installed in 1792. You can also see an
early 19th century shower. The bath holds 8,324 litres of
water!
The bells for the servants
The Chapel (the walls and ceiling decoration is all painted in
"trompe l'oeil".
The Housekeeper's Dry Store. The chests on the bottom held
different sorts of tea. They must have been very fond of it!
The Butler's Pantry
The view from the the front of the house
Lunch at "The Old Rectory Restuarant"
After lunch, we dropped
James and Caroline at the station and returned to our
accommodation. About an hour later, we set off again to the
city to go to Evensong at St John's College. The choir was
"The St John's Voices" rather than the actual college choir.
The music included the Responses by Rose, the canticles by
Stanford in B flat and thne anthem "I Was Glad" by Parry (yes,
again!). This time the "vivats" were
included. The choir was excellent in every way - good diction
and blending, lovely phrasing and great dynamics.
This lovely lectern sits just
outside the chapel at St.John's and is not used anymore.
It doesn't look impressed!
The chapel at St John's is
wonderful! It was designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott
and was constructed between 1866 and 1869. We were not
really supposed to take photos but I couldn't help
myself.