Moonshine

From this,



to this,

and finally this.

For the price of 4 lemons and a bag of sugar, several litres of Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall's (stop your sniggering Lisa) Elderflower Champagne. Perfect for quoffing on a hot summers day.

Summers are made of.....

A FAB in the garden,


A fridge full of beer,

Oh to be in England,

Now that summers here.

What does your summer look like?

The last leg

So we left Over Haddon and the Lathkill Hotel and walked down the hill to the bottom of the valley where the river runs again.

I couldn't get close enough for a photo, but we saw a pair of swans with two fluffy cygnets. A chap who was watching them too told us that this was their second pair of cygnets as they had lost their first. They were so beautiful.

Yes Lisa, the Haddon Estate belongs to Haddon Hall. They look after the rivers here - they are full of big fat brown trout - we watched them from this bridge.

Another "Des Res". There are many beautiful houses around here.

Eventually we pass through Allport and turn to return to Youlgreave. Here, the river Lathkill is joined by the very gentle river Bradford. This too is teeming with fish. The villagers dam this river in summer(they have built a sluice gate on it) and it gets deep enough to swim in. At the end of the day, they just open the sluice gate again. Its a great place to spend a hot sunny afternoon.

We walked back up the steep hill to the village, passing the pretty little cottages and their lovely gardens.

As we reached the top of the hill, we saw that the church was open for its flower festival, so we popped in..

We had a lovely day - it is one of my favourite places and I love to walk it at different times of year. I'm glad you could join me.

Introducing Uncle Geoff

So, continuing our walk.
We crossed the pretty little bridge across the river Lathkill, then turned to go up the hill to Over Haddon.


This was our destination.

Uncle Geoffs tea rooms and the most eccentric place for lunch EVER! (Rosie and Rowan, I insist you try this tea room and tell me what you think). Now uncle Geoff is really "mutton Geoff" - he is as deaf as a post and must be 150 years old, and he runs this place all on his own. The tea room is a little place, through his garage and behind his house.

Its amazing and so mad!!! Perfect place for me then.

He has 4 tables - each seating 4 and the walls and ceilings are covered in photos and quotes.

I had the most expensive dish on the menu - Fish, Chips and pea - £3.40 and totally delicious. His cakes looked fabulous and were home made too. He also does tea's and coffees (his pot of tea was the best pot of tea hubby and I had ever had) and he does ice creams too - so if you don't want a full meal, you can simply call in for a look and a lolly! It really is the most wonderful little place.

We then set off for our next destination - not too far away. The views from the main street in Over Haddon are truly beautiful.

We passed their Well dressing - they have a butterfly theme happening here.

Ah yes, the Lathkill Hotel. (Incidentally the lunches here are brilliant too - just not as great value as Uncle Geoffs). They do have a few rooms here too - must book a romantic weekend sometime.

I had to try a swift half of Ing-ger-land by the famous (locally) Kelham island Brewery (I have taken you there before, but if you missed it, worry not, I'll be going back - purely for blogging purposes.) I can report that the ale was most fine and went down very well on this now boiling hot afternoon.

These are the best views from a pub that I have ever seen.

It was a shame that we had to leave. We continued our walk down to Allport where the Lathkill meets the river Bradford. I'll show you the last part of our beautiful walk tomorrow.

Thursday Date - part 1

For our Thursday "date", hubby and I decided to do my favourite walk which is from Youlgreave in Derbyshire to Over Haddon and back. Youlgreave is a really pretty village - I could easily see myself living here. It's "Well Dressing " season in these parts - I loved this one.


It looked as if the farmer had called home for elevenses! - I loved this old tractor,

This is the reason that we will never live in a small cottage. He wouldn't fit!

However he would fit quite nicely in this one!

It started to drizzle a bit at this point, but it didn't dampen the day.

We walked through several meadows - all bursting with wild flowers.

They say that "one swallow doesn't make a summer", but I think you only need one skylark to make a summer. Its not a great photo (still getting used to my camera), but we disturbed this Skylark who sang his summery tune for us. I tried to video it so you could hear it, but that didn't work either Must read the instruction manual.

As we got over the hill, the sky cleared and it started to get hot. I love this farm on the valley. I think it is part of the Haddon Estate.

The farmhouse is lovely.

But I think the barns and outbuildings are better.

We were eyed with suspicion by these youngsters.

As we descended into the valley over the other side, we spied this magnificent fungi.

In the bottom of this valley, the river Lathkill runs. Often at this time of year, in parts it seems to disappear. It runs underground for some of the way.

On the printed walk, you turn right at this point and follow the river, however we made a detour (up the very steep hill!) to somewhere really unique and very special. I'll tell you about that tomorrow. xxx

The Holey City

Hubby and I both had a day off work today - so we went on a date - and a very lovely day out we had too. To get to our destination, we had to drive through Sheffield - I thought I would show you what the verges on the main road looked like - beautiful.

Hubby was highly amused by the van in front!!

I'll show you where we went tomorrow.

Wombled treasure

I love beachcombing. As you know, I am a "womble" and am forever finding "rubbish" to bring home. My favourite part of the day in St Ives, was when the tide was low and hubby and I could go for a walk to find treasure. Apart from the heart shaped pebbles, everything else that we found was "rubbish - sea glass, pottery, broken bouys etc. All of it was transformed by the sea into treasure. I thought the lovely blue nuggets that Carolyn had made for me when perfectly with the collection. It looks lovely when the candle glows at night.

Hues of blues & greens

My favourite colours are blues and greens - especially together. My living room is blue and green, and so are most of the things I have planted in the garden (nature has thrown a few freebies my way that are certainly not in keeping with the theme though!!).

I love the lavender against the garage door

The white roses look perfect this year

The delphiniums are much better than last year when they almost all got eaten by slugs. I think a combination of wine corks, resident hungry toads (yes, he found a friend!!! there are now two of them) and evening slug hunts are paying off this year.
The Hosta was from my grandads garden. I split it into three this year and its never looked so good!

This time of year is my favourite in the garden - especially when the weather is hot, and I don't have to move out of it.