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We had another late start today but after a check on the MET office app, National Trust's Kingston Lacy seemed to be our best chance of avoiding the rain so that's where we headed, arriving just after 1. We had a cream tea each for lunch in the cafe - which was as ever overrrun and under-staffed (a common trait of National Trust properties we've found). The house has timed entry tickets and it was suggested online that we should have booked these in advance, fortunately they seemed to have plenty left for all of the timeslots (which are every 15 minutes), so after our cream tea, we went for a wander inside.

The house is pretty vast and is set over three floors with the usual grand rooms, although these seemed to be more dimly lit than usual so the guides were using torches to highlight things to the visitors. The real highlight has to be the bedrooms in the ceiling, these are described as tented bedrooms, decorated to look like the inside of a tent. The effect was amazing - I wonder if it would work in our top bedroom...

We decided to try the White Lion, which is a short walk away from the cottage, for tea. The restaurant was fully booked but we were able to order food and sit at a table in the bar area. The food was very good, Dani had a burger, whilst I had steak and kidney pie, both were served with huge chunk chips. It was very nice, but incredibly filling, so after a rather slow walk back to the cottage, we spent the rest of the evening slothed on the sofa, nursing a food baby before calling it a night. 

We had a bit of a lie-in today and after a late breakfast we decided to head for Bath. The weather was a bit wet and we had already decided that we needed to do a bit of shopping. We were aiming for the park and ride having read that parking can be a bit of a nightmare, but having lost track of the signs, we found ourselves in the city centre, helpfully just by a car park, so we dived in. As it turned out the car park was really quite central, just around the corner from Debenhams.

It remained fairly drizzly through the day although seemed to stop leaving just cloud later in the afternoon. We managed to pick up a few bits, I got some t-shorts and jeans and Dani picked up a couple of new tops. We also finally managed to get ourselves a jug after what seems like months of looking - we settled on a small red Cornishware one from a shop that sold a bit of everything. All in all a pretty successful day! 

We had prebooked tickets for Stonehenge today so headed in that direction just after 11. It took a little longer to get there than expected as the main road from which you get a view understandably crawls to almost a halt, presumably as people stare out the window and try and snap a quick picture. Either way we made it in the end just before out timed ticket slot ended. There turned out to be a massive queue however for members or prebooked tickets which made the prebooking part fairly redundant. From the visitor centre you can either catch a short shuttle bus to the site or you can take a stroll through the fields to get there. We decided to go for the walk there, figuring we would catch the bus back. Stonehenge itself is quite something to behold. It is quite a lot larger than I had imagined with some of the rocks standing over 7m tall (with a further 2m below ground apparently). We had a fairly gentle walk round the path, listening to the audio guide. We stoped about halfway round sitting on a bench to eat the packed lunch we had taken with us, the weather was cloudy, but it was still very warm. We caught the bus back to the visitor centre and stopped for an ice-cream (I had choclate, Dani had mint-choc-chip), before heading on to Salisbury.

We decided to look for parking in the city centre rather than opting for the park and ride, this seemed to work out quite well as we managed to park for free close to Sainsburys in the city centre (Dani had read that Salisbury council were offering more free parking to encourage people to support the local businesses). It was much sunnier here and we headed straight for the very grand looking cathedral. There was an installation of doves inside that is part of a city wide project to brin a message of hope and peace following the nerve agent attack earlier this year. Although the cathedral itself is quite plain inside it remains quite magificent, and the installation from the ceiling looked perfectly at home. Whilst there we had a look at the best surviving copy of the Magna Carter which resides in Salisbury Cathedral, there was a short queue to see it with a guide explaining its importance and then in the same room, there was some further information about how the ink was made from oak galls which were something to do with wasps.

Heading out, we stopped by National Trust Mompesson House, which is just a stones throw from the Cathedral. Mompesson is an 18th century town house and garden that was aquired in the 1970s. The house doesn't contain the original furniture so this is made up of loans from the wider National Trust collection. We managed to get in just before closing so only had time for a quick scoot about. It was pretty splendid inside, very much like the larger country mansions just on a smaller scale. The garden was just coming into flower and offered a nice view of the cathedral spire over the local rooftops.

Headed back to the cottage a little after 5, chilli for tea!

We're kind of at the half way stage with the exams at school, but thankfully half term has arrived and we can breathe a little. We booked a little cottage in Dorset for the week called the Old Shop, and arrived here yesterday. The cottage is really nice having quite recently been renovated and on our arrival we were treated to a welcome pack of scones, jam and Dorset tea - very nice indeed. Today we went to National Trust Stourhead which is about 10 minutes away from the cottage.

It's a pretty vast estate with large gardens to wander through and the rooms on the ground floor of the house. Although the weather this morning was a little cloudy, by late afternoon it was really hot and sunny as we wandered through the gardens. The garden was really colourful with lots of Azaleas and Rhododendrons in full flower and we saw Goslings and a Coot sitting on a nest with eggs underneath. A great start to our break away! 

The sun is out again this weekend, we've spent the day in the garden, tring to rejuvinate the lawn and putting in a few new plants including some clematis and a rather tasteful new grass. We decided to have a little walk down to the park late in the afternoon after we saw someone has posted a picture of some duckings on facebook.

Low and behold, there were a nice little huddle of them and I managed to get a few pictures - hope you're all enjoying the sunshine!

The weather has certainly been on show this bank holiday weekend, with soaring temperatures, blue skies and sunshine all weekend. We've tried to make the most of it with a day out at National Trust Cliveden on Saturday, and then some time tidying the garden over the last couple of days. Cliveden was looking lovely in the sunshine and has had its shiny gold guilded gates along the south terrace fitted since our last visit. We had a nice wander about in the sunshine, both catching the sun a bit and looking a little red by the time the evening came around.

Yesterday we went to B&Q to get a few new bits for the garden. We bought some new pots and a couple of really nice Acers which we've added to the border. We generally gave the border a tidy and cut the grass which has shot up a bit over the last few weeks. The border is looking a lot neater, the grass on the other hand isn't in quite such a good state having become quite mossy and developed a few bare patches, we've got some stuff to treat it, so hopefully we'll see some improvement. We bought a few more bits today including a water butt which I've installed at the back of the house and a shiny metal watering can. Finally we've had a BBQ for tea, the third BBQ this bank holiday #winning!

I hope you all had a great bank holiday too!