Spring Visits

April 1, 2022 / fgrtommo / Leave a comment

Ok, so yesterday afternoon we had a brief blizzard of snowflakes, but Spring is well and truly here! Trees are starting to reveal their leaves and the blackthorn has been in flower for weeks. Cherries and magnolias are in full bloom. Lambs have arrived in the fields adjacent to and opposite our house. Their carefree gambolling about on wobbly legs is always a huge pleasure to watch at this time of year.

Worryingly, but not unexpectedly given the fact of global warming, Spring seems earlier every year. Even by mid-March I was starting to see a range of butterflies (including Brimstone, Clouded Yellow, Small Tortoiseshell, Orange Tip and Red Admiral). But, whenever Spring feels like it has arrived, it is always a joy.

Once again, during a trip to Edinburgh, the weather was very kind. One time in the future when we visit Edinburgh, all our sunny days there so far are going to be repaid by relentless rain and grey but… not yet!

*^{On Carlton Hill, Edinburgh With FG (Asleep And Out Of Shot)}*

On this trip there was the novelty and pleasure of picking up my Dad on the way and taking him up to Edinburgh with us. That enabled him to see Edinburgh again for the first time in a decade or so but also, critically, to meet his great grandchild (our First Grandchild (FG)). It was actually too, the first time he had me FG’s mother since previous attempts to meet up had been thwarted by train cancellations or pandemic restrictions. The building of new relationships even extended to my Dad meeting FG’s other grandparents over a lovely lunch at their flat.

Of course, Long-Suffering Wife (LSW) and I did our pram-pushing duties to send FG off to sleep while taking in the sights and smells of Edinburgh. (There is a brewery in the city and the smell of hops reminded me of the breweries in my home town of Reading when I was a kid.) Once again we visited the excellent Royal Botanic Garden which was perfect in the sun.

*^{Inside The Alpine Houses At The Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh}*

*^{The Obligatory (But Lovely) Slew Of Daffodils In The Royal Botanical Gardens}*

In the Botanic Garden entrance hall was a colourful and interesting exhibition (called ‘Forth Lines’) of local artists’ embroidery with each of 96 panels depicting a point along the Firth of Forth coastline. FG stayed asleep long enough for me to enjoy it and to encourage my thinking about future walks along that coastline.

*^{Sample Rows Of Embroidery Pieces By Local Artists And Residents Along The Firth Of Forth (The ‘Forth Lines’ Exhibition)}*

*^{One Of The Individual Panels From The ‘Forth Lines’ Exhibition (By Kathleen Wilson)}*

Another exhibition I visited while in Edinburgh was a major exhibition of John James Audubon’s pictures of birds at the National Museum of Scotland. My Dad has long been interested in Audubon and I tagged along since I love exhibitions of this sort and it was great to share the experience with my Dad. It is an excellent exhibition. Our only wish was that there would be more on the process of actually executing the drawings, engravings and colouration – it was clearly a substantial team effort. Regardless of this, the resultant prints on show are stunning and the explanations of them and of Audubon’s life were fascinating.

Audubon was certainly a rather strange character. He was born in 1785 in Haiti to French parents – a plantation owner and his maid – and became a self-trained naturalist, artist and hunter.

Audubon had many contradictions. He owned slaves and dabbled in ideas related to eugenics but took funding from slavery abolitionists. He shot thousands of birds in his life but was also one of the first to document how industrialisation and agriculture were destroying bird habitats. His lack of an academic background meant many in the scientific community in America denigrated him but he was – with his drawing talent, determination to succeed and his wild looks (complete with bear oil slicked hair) – a big hit in the academic and artistic circles of Edinburgh.

*^{Detail From Plate 26 Of ‘Birds Of America’ – ‘Carolina Parrot’ by Audubon}*

It was here and then London that he gained sponsorship for (apparently £2m in today’s money) and published his most famous and hugely popular work, ‘The Birds of America’. The huge volumes consist of 435 hand-coloured, life-size prints of 497 bird species, made from engraved copper plates of various sizes depending on the size of the image. One of the volumes was on show at the exhibition alongside numerous individual prints. The book was extravagantly large because, remarkably, each bird picture it contained was drawn at life size.

*^{One Of The Volumes Of Audubon’s ‘Birds Of America’}*

The prints on show were vibrant and wonderful and the lack of crowds at the exhibition meant that the stunning detail could be seen up close and at leisure. That many of Audubon’s prints boasted incorrectly of newly discovered species or were anatomically incorrect didn’t matter given the high quality of the overall impact.

*^{Detail From Plate 72 Of ‘Birds Of America’ – ‘Swallow Tailed Hawk’ by Audubon}*

The exhibition was also good because it told Audubon’s story about his talent (and the way the world responded to it) interestingly, and it was honest about his flaws. Most of all, it was great to have the afternoon with my Dad sharing something so memorable.

*^{Although We Didn’t Explore It Beyond the Audubon Exhibition This Time, The National Museum of Scotland Is In a Lovely Building}*

To round off March, LSW and I visited The Newt Garden in Somerset for the second time this year. Spring has definitely come to this 350 acre garden and woodland. Already, the myriad varieties of cordon and espaliered apple plants are starting to come into flower.

*^{The Newt Gardens – The Parabola Garden}*

As reported in this blog several times before, it is a wonderful garden which continues to evolve and grow. This time we were able to visit with two friends from our village which added a lovely extra dimension which was topped off by a delicious lunch in the Garden restaurant. I’m looking forward already to visiting again later in the year.

*^{The Gardeners Cottage And Magnolia From The Victorian Garden At The Newt}*

Before that, we have April to look forward to: a re-warming of the weather, the Football League run-in of the final games of the season (I go in hope for Forest Green Rovers), more blossoming of plants and shrubs, thriving seedlings (again, I hope), and Easter with Youngest Son and his partner. Not a bad prospect but what a shame it is the global context of Russia’s dire attack on Ukraine. Spring is sprung but not everyone can appreciate it right now.

^{Bonus Photos of Sunny Edinburgh}

New Year Resolution Trips

January 24, 2022 / fgrtommo / Leave a comment

Since retiring over 4 years ago, I have been pretty diligent at making and tracking progress against annual New Year resolutions. Progress this year was patchy. I met my alcohol-free days and alcohol unit reduction targets. I also exceeded my target of an average of 15,000 steps a day, and my weight has just about stayed within the target range. However, intentions to step up organisation of the vegetable garden and composting facilities have remained unfulfilled and I read a woefully small number of books this year.

This time last year, Long-Suffering Wife (LSW) and I made a new, joint resolution to travel around the UK more. Covid has, of course, restricted overseas trips and our sons are now living all around the UK – in Belfast, London and Edinburgh. So perhaps inevitably, we have done more travelling around the UK than in the past, culminating in our Christmas on Skye, Scotland.

Our joint New Year resolution this year is to step up and renew our familiarity with the UK even more. We have already started with a few trips this January and are lucky enough to have the prospect of many more this year.

*^{I Never Tire Of London And Views Of The Thames; This One At Dusk}*

We had to travel up to London briefly to prepare the Barbican flat for sale. There is another such trip later this week. London is always a pleasure for me; there is so much going on to see and do (even in a pandemic). This time, as well as seeing Middle Son and his partner for dinner at one of our long-time favourite restaurants (Moro), we went to exhibitions in the Barbican and in Tate Modern. Plus, I managed a couple of hours in the Imperial War Museum.

*^{Lubaina Himid Exhibition At Tate Modern}*

Lubaina Himid’s exhibition at Tate Modern was substantial and well done. The vibrant colours and range of work were impressive but I can’t say I was entirely convinced or entranced by the pieces on show. The pictures sometimes captured movement but didn’t generate dynamism for me and the sonic works, while interesting and atmospheric, weren’t arresting. However, we both liked the bright colours and thought it was an exhibition worth seeing – especially as LSW is a member so tickets were available and felt free.

*^{‘Old Boat/New Money’ (Accompanied By Sounds of Sea And Ships) By Lubaina Himid At Tate Modern}*

We both thought that the Isamu Noguchi exhibition at the Barbican was much more interesting. The Guardian newspaper review of the exhibition rather poo-pooed the exhibition as being more like a luxury lighting show room. Certainly there were a lot of lovely lighting exhibits on show but there was so much more. I enjoyed a lot of the sculptures, some of the ceramics and, especially, the way the exhibition juxtaposed these with the light-based works.

*^{Views Of The Noguchi Exhibition At The Barbican}*

As usual, too, the Barbican had put together a clear explanation of the progression of Noguchi’s ideas as they developed through his life. I thought it was an excellent exhibition.

*^{More Views Of The Noguchi Exhibition At The Barbican}*

A friend in our village recently recommended a visit to the London Imperial War Museum. So, when I found myself nearby, while LSW was shopping near Borough Market, I took myself off there to investigate the recently commissioned Holocaust Galleries. These build up a picture of the Second World War Holocaust through hundreds of photos and the telling of many stories of Jews and other minority groups persecuted by the Nazis in run up to the war and then during it.

This bottom up approach required time to absorb but had a layering and relentlessness to it that I found very powerful. The portrayal of the seemingly inexorable drive to horror, from before the First World War to the Final Solution, was well done and did not shy away from the relative indifference of the world until it was too late. The history is well known but, nonetheless, rather depressing and the exhibition’s intermingling of the stories of individuals with items indicating the sheer scale of the atrocities was as shocking as ever. My brief tour of some of the other sections of the museum showing uniforms, planes, tanks and rockets felt a bit trivial afterwards and I’ll have to revisit those another day.

Prior to our London trip we made our first visit of the year to The Newt Garden in East Somerset. As readers of this blog will know, we have been a few times before. We love it because it is already a spectacular garden and it is continuing to evolve so there always seems to be something new to see (this time, a Japanese Garden and a ‘Beezantium’ – an exhibition about bees). There is also a lovely restaurant.

*^{View Of The Newt Hotel From The Gardens}*

We are now members and to justify the cost of membership we will have to go a few more times this year – what a hardship!

Then, after London, we had a day out at Compton Verney which is an exhibition space and park that we had not visited before. LSW had seen a recommendation on one of the many social media connections she has. Specifically this was for two exhibitions that were coming to a close. One was of Grinling Gibbons, a master woodcarver (2021 was the 300^th anniversary of his death) the other was of paintings by John Nash (younger brother of the more famous wartime painter, Paul Nash).

*^{Sea Of Aconites In Front Of Compton Verney House}*

Both exhibitions were popular, a little crowded and worth seeing. Grinling Gibbons’s background (initially around the docks in Holland) and his drive to network and commercialise as he built up his business in England was described clearly and interestingly and the pieces on show were terrifically detailed and impressive. However, the full impact of his work would be best appreciated in the houses where his carvings still decorate walls today and I’d have liked to have found out more about how the work was done.

*^{Example Of The Detailed Carvings Of Grinling Gibbons}*

The John Nash exhibition was also well put together and illustrated carefully how his career developed through the First World War, through his love of the countryside, then as a War artist in the Second World war and finally as a retiree travelling the UK and settling in his rural surroundings (as, among other things, a seed catalog and gardening book illustrator). Unfortunately, apart from a few notable exceptions (see ‘Over The Top’ below), I didn’t like the paintings as much as I had hoped (or expected); insufficient liveliness of colour in too many of the works for my liking.

The house grounds, designed by Capability Brown, were lovely in the sun (though muddy underfoot) and the lunch in the restaurant was very reasonable. It was another good day out very much in line with our New Year resolution to get out of the house and our immediate locale rather more. Later this week: London and Edinburgh!

^{January Sunrise At Home. Trips Are Nice, But Home Is Too!}

The Newt Revisited and Weekend Rituals

December 13, 2020 / fgrtommo / Leave a comment

For the first time in months, Long-Suffering Wife (LSW) and I got in the car and had an all-day outing together. We went to The Newt hotel and garden in East Somerset. We left quite early so that we could walk around the ever-evolving garden and then have a leisurely lunch at the hotel before drifting back home feeling full and very satisfied.

*One Of The Views Across The Newt Gardens – With More Landscaping Underway In The Distance*

We have visited The Newt garden a couple of times over the last year or so. It is a wonderful space even at this time of the year. The attention to detail everywhere is amazing. The garden construction and quality exudes wealth, but also love for craftsmanship and plants. What I like especially is that the garden is continuing to develop rapidly. That makes it worth visiting time and time again, not just from one season to the next, but year to year.

*A New Plant Frame In The Constantly Changing The Newt Gardens*

The entry pass is valid for a year. As a result, there is a risk that parts of the garden nearest the entrance and the surrounds of the café, cider works and firepit, are being overrun by local mothers with pushchairs with toddlers and babies finding socially distanced company in a lovely environment. However, it’s nice to see children enjoying the garden and, anyway, there are several paths off the beaten track which could explore while LSW perused the quality products in the shop.

Lunch, in a glass roofed annex to the carefully restored hotel and amid several equally trim outbuildings, was excellent. We drank cider produced on the premises rather than wine. I haven’t had cider for many years but it was lovely and, having become inured to the high cost of quality craft beer over recent years, I may buy some to take away next time we visit. The whole day was a lovely break from lockdown routine.

*The Newt Gardens: Beautiful Textures And Colours*

In that lockdown routine, the differences between Saturdays and Sundays and every other day have become decreasingly distinct. Those differences between workdays and weekends were huge pre-retirement. For most of the latter couple of decades of my working life, I worked in London but returned to the family home in Gloucestershire on Friday nights and left again on Sunday afternoons. So, not only was the weekend activity different from the other days, the location and immediate company was different too.

Sometimes work impinged on the weekend – sometimes very considerably – and that blurred the weekend but, now I’m retired, Saturdays and Sundays are almost identical to every other day. At times it feels like it is only the day and date on the newspaper voucher I hand over at the newsagent every day that keeps me grounded in the progression of the week.

However, there has remained some structure to my weeks in retirement and LSW and I do still have some rituals that distinguish between the weekends and the rest – albeit some have been disrupted by the current pandemic.

For example, the pandemic and the associated lockdown of hospitality has disrupted our regular Sunday visit to the local pub. Since retirement, and since the village pub reopened a few years ago, we have popped up to the pub, usually via a lengthy walk, to finish the weekend quick crossword over a couple of Sunday lunchtime drinks. Now limiting our visits to a quick drink without a complementing lunch is disallowed under the lockdown restrictions. The only good thing about this is that my weekly alcohol intake has reduced and so my New Year resolution with regard to alcohol is well within reach.

*Forest Green Rovers’ Current Stadium (Second Highest in England After West Bromwich Albion’s The Hawthorns)*

The Covid-19 pandemic has also disrupted my attendance at live local football on Saturday afternoons. Two local teams I sometimes watch have played no football for several weeks and the team I love, Forest Green Rovers, have only been watchable on live internet streams. Watching live football has long been part of my weekend schedule. So, it felt a little bit wonderful (despite the bone crunching cold) when, yesterday, I was able to return to a live game at my football team’s stadium to watch the mighty Rovers triumph. I’m still hoarse this morning from all the vocal support (through a face mask) during the game – just like the ‘old days’.

*Getting Ready For Forest Green Rovers 2 Cambridge 0*

Amid all this weekend routine disruption, one weekend ritual has been maintained: bread! Breakfasts during the week are, for me, fruit, yogurt and granola; for LSW they are more varied but are usually porridge and some combination of fruit, seeds and syrup. At weekends, we abandon all that healthy stuff and have slice upon slice of locally made bread (Salt Bakehouse sourdough is our favourite). On Saturday’s I have it untoasted and slathered with home-made jam. On Sundays I have it toasted with Marmite; always! That way, I know which day is Saturday and which day is Sunday 🙂

Revisiting The Newt And Hauser & Wirth

March 2, 2020March 2, 2020 / fgrtommo / Leave a comment

Last autumn, Long-Suffering Wife (LSW) and I visited the new garden in East Somerset adjoining a smart, refurbished hotel called The Newt. This is a large and new garden that is the realised dream of a wealthy South African couple who had previously built the wonderful Babylonstoren complex near Cape Town which we visited a couple of years ago.

The Newt Gardens: The Bathing Pond Looking Up To The Cascade And Conservatory

I described our first visit to The Newt gardens in this blog and won’t repeat my impressions here in any detail. Suffice to say that the garden is of very high quality design and execution and it continues to develop. It is therefore worth seeing, not only through the seasons, but also from year to year so that one can follow its evolution. The cost of entry has gone up to £20 each but that includes unlimited visits for a year. We will certainly try to go back this summer.

The Nest Gardens: The Cider Press, Bar And Cellar

The Newt Gardens: The Bathing Pond Looking Up To The Cascade And Conservatory

We visited the gardens with two very old friends who had come to stay with us for a couple of days. We were fortunate that the day we chose for the trip was one of only a handful of dry, sunny days we have had in February. We maximised the value of the weather by lunching at the bright, airy and excellent At The Chapel in Bruton and then visiting the nearby Somerset branch of Hauser & Wirth galleries and its Piet Oudolf garden.

We have visited Hauser & Wirth a few times and always find it interesting. On this occasion there were two exhibitions – both free. The first was of some work by a Swiss guy (memorably) named Not Vital. He is interested in architecture and the relationship between buildings and landscape and people. The shiny metal building shapes gave off interesting reflections – and co-incidentally mimicked the shape of the nearby dovecote on a hillside overlooking the gallery – but I didn’t really ‘get’ the rest of the work.

‘Cannot Enter Cannot Exit’ By Not Vital At Hauser & Wirth (With The Dovecote In The Distance)

Much more absorbing was a range of work on display by an apparently famous photographer called Don McCullin. I wasn’t familiar with him but our friends – both of whom are keen photographers – were and so our visit had propitious timing for them. Certainly the range of subject matter in the photographs, which were all black and white, was broad: from local countryside to industrial wastelands, from peaceful riverside views in India to war-torn Syria and the bleak stillness of the Arctic. Many of the pictures really did draw the viewer in and even my untutored eye for photography could see they had gravitas.

‘Batcombe Vale’ By Don McCullin

As the sun started to set, we eventually found a path to the nearby ruined Bruton Dovecote that we had spotted from the restaurant earlier. Our stay at this viewpoint was truncated slightly by the imminent arrival of some other tourists. We had inadvertently misdirected them earlier as we struggled to find our way to the dovecote and we were too embarrassed to engage them again. In any case, the view was a nice way to round off a sunny day in the country.

Bruton Dovecote, East Somerset

Certainly sunny and dry days have been rare recently. Many in the UK far have been far less fortunate that us. We have been able to just observe the flooding and full rivers rather than finding ourselves caught up in the misery of having a flooded home. Indeed, the rain and resulting sodden ground has been a continuing, excellent excuse to postpone any attack on the overgrown and untended vegetable patch and allotment.

Rainwater Overwhelming Local Drains And Filling Streams

Instead of gardening, I have been hunkering down in my study writing up the results of the recent Village Meeting I helped to arrange to discuss how we make our village more resilient and responsive to the Climate Emergency. There were expected threads of thought around reducing energy demand through insulation and generating local energy. However, the main theme that arose was that we need to operate even more as a neighbourly community that shares (things, services and knowledge), especially where this leads to avoiding new purchases through borrowing, recycling/upcycling and reuse.

Unfortunately, two weeks after the meeting, we have suffered a blow to this community-strengthening aspiration in that the pub in the centre of the village has closed. This was not unexpected and is hopefully temporary.

The Pub In The Centre Of The Village: The Hog

I recently organised a social evening in the pub to try to encourage more local use of its facilities. I am getting increasingly involved in local activities of that sort. Once the Neighbourhood Plan is complete – and good progress has been made on that recently – I will have more time to engage with groups that might energise the pub and other community buildings we have such as the church and shop. LSW is pleased I am getting more involved in village life and I confess that I am enjoying it much more than I anticipated when I retired.

Visiting The Newt And Going Abroad

October 29, 2019March 2, 2020 / fgrtommo / 1 Comment

Autumn is well and truly here. The weather has been very variable. Days of heavy rain sufficient to test guttering, fill the local streams to brimming, and force a frustrating postponement of a Forest Green Rovers Football Club fixture, have been followed by frosty nights and wonderfully cloudless, sunny days. The trees are turning brown at different rates depending on their species and health. The woodland views from my normal walk routes are glorious patchworks of subdued colour.

Autumn: Long Shadows, First Frost And Full Streams

Last week, Long-Suffering Wife LSW) and I used one of the days we had once reserved for a trip abroad, long since postponed, to do a more modest excursion into East Somerset. Over the last five years or so, we have become quite familiar with the countryside there and some of the pubs, restaurant and galleries around Bruton. It’s a lovely area and Time Out Magazine calls Bruton ‘a bit like an abridged Stoke Newington with better air quality’ with its interesting shops, eateries and architecture.

This time, we visited a new garden set in the grounds of a large mansion that has recently been developed as a hotel called The Newt. The garden has only been open to visitors in recent months and is still under construction. However, the main bones of the garden, services and on-site workshops (producing cider, bread and other delicacies), are in place. It has great views over the local countryside and is already somewhere I would recommend highly.

£15 initially seemed a bit steep for a garden that is so young and new. But whole enterprise exudes class, attention to detail and quality; the visit (including a lovely lunch) was very good value. We arrived just in time for a very interesting garden tour by one of the 18-strong operational gardening and woodlands management team. The guide was every bit as impressive as the things he pointed out and he was able to give a few insights into the history of the house and garden.

The Newt Reception: Apple Display And Roof Sculpture

The estate, of which The Newt has become a core feature, was created in the 17th century. From 1785 it was home to several generations of the Liberal Hobhouse family, including Arthur Hobhouse, a founder of the national parks system in England and Wales.

The Newt: Views Through The Woodland

The South African pair of Karen Roos and Koos Bekker (a telecoms magnate) then bought the property in 2013. They had previously developed Babylonstoren near Cape Town which is a marvellous garden and winery that LSW and I had loved during our visit to South Africa in 2017. At The Newt, they have converted the Palladian fronted mansion into a luxury hotel and invested hugely in a transformation of the garden and outbuildings. The have used the garden designer (a Frenchman called Patrice Taravella) they employed at Babylonstoren. As a result, by design, The Newt has a similar feel to Babylonstoren but is a tribute to the apple and cider rather than the grape and wine.

Panoramic View Of The Parabola Garden

The centre-piece is a walled, egg-shaped garden, called ‘The Parabola’ with multiple centres, terraces and running water. It is filled with 250 varieties of apple tied to laths (thin strips of wood) pinned to the walls or being trained up metal arches. All are under-planted simply with a relatively small variety of herbs. The whole ‘Parabola’, is tilted south towards a huge view and is already spectacular. It will be even more so when the apple trees are more mature.

The Newt: Water Runs In The Parabola Garden

This central show orchard is surrounded by a variety of differently cultivated areas. These include cottage gardens, grass gardens, lawns populated by chickens, and three small walled ‘colour’ gardens filled with plants of white, then blue, then red. Below the long lawn and bathing pond (now for newts!) in front of the hotel, the vegetable garden is particularly impressive (and clearly devoid of the badger and deer damage we are so familiar with at home!) The woodland provides gentle walks away from the main buildings and we saw plans to open these up further.

The Newt: Old Hunting Dog Kennels, Now Chicken And Duck House

The Newt: Vegetable Garden, Long Lawn and Hotel

The Newt: Quirky Fountains

We are planning to re-visit The Newt both in Spring and in about 4 years, by which time further developments will have taken place and the planting will have matured.

The Newt: Conservatory and Olives

Now Autumn has arrived and LSW has finished work for the season, we plan to go on more trips like the one to The Newt.

Also, finally, we have scheduled a short trip abroad. With Brexit being postponed again we are slipping in a trip to Venice in November. Given it is only for 3 nights, travelling by train is impractical so we are opting to offset our carbon expenditure in the air. Ryan Air include this option in their booking process but it appears not to charge enough given that the ‘bad’ gases from flights go immediately into the upper atmosphere where they are not broken down. I used Solar Aid to top up the offset contribution.

We have always recognised that we needed to visit Venice – so many have told us that it must not be missed and that it is unbelievably beautiful. Hopefully the weather will be as kind as it was when we visited The Newt but I’m sure we will love it anyway, and won’t have damaged the planet too much.

Postscript: Goodbye October Celebrated Nicely In Our Local Pub's Octoberfest

Postscript: Goodbye October – Celebrated Nicely At Our Local Pub’s Octoberfest

My Retirement Journey

I've Retired! What Next?

The Newt