Our friends from the farm shop a few days ago told us we had to visit Hidcote Gardens. This is something I had never heard of, but they were so adamant that we needed to see this, how could we resist?! As it turned out, the gardens were only about 6 miles away from our little cottage - another picture perfect car ride through the countryside.
In 1900 an American, Lawrence Johnston, and his mother settled in Britain and purchased Hidecote Manor Estate. Seven years later Johnston began turning the fields around the house into a garden....and completed his vision in 1922. The gardens are designed in "rooms" using hedges, trees, and stone walls to define the rooms. There are ponds, fountains, gazebos, and are planted very heavily...it is "planned" but also wild and natural at the same time. Interestingly enough, Johnston had no formal horticulture training...he just had a vision in his mind of what he wanted! We were happy just wandering all around, ohh-ing and ahh-ing at how beautiful it was. This property is now a National Trust property. Everywhere we looked there was something gorgeous to see. I would love to know how many full time gardeners it takes to maintain the 10.5 acre garden! If you don't like looking at photos of flowers and gardens, just skip ahead because I'm about to flood you with exactly that!
This was so interesting to see at the entrance...earphones for sensitive visitors who might find too much noise to be too stimulating. I think this was the gentle British way of accommodating people on the spectrum...which was lovely and so thoughtful.
This was the house where Mr. Johnston and his mother lived.
Lots of cutouts in the hedges to get from one "room" to another.
The peony plants were just starting to blossom.
These trees reminded me of the trees in Place de Voges in Paris. I love how they are manicured to be so square.
There were 2 gazebos in the garden where they used to serve tea!
Hard to see but the woman in the blue jacket with white hair (no, it's not me!) was weeding a bed of flowers!
This guy was very carefully putting some sort of brown paste on a "wound" at the base of the tree...working very gently and methodically.
I don't know what these plants were but they looked like something from another planet. None of the plants are labeled. His logic was that in nature, things are not labeled...you can enjoy them without labels! And the garden has continued on honoring his original vision without labels.
Don't slip!!
At the edge of the garden were sheep (of course!)
Long hedges dividing the garden into "rooms"
Even the walkways and paths were beautiful.
The wisteria was just "dripping"!
I did NOT expect to see California poppies here!!
This wall of lilacs smelled DIVINE!!! I smelled them before I came around the corner and saw them...white dark and light purple.
I thought this was a sweet tribute plaque.
This was the veggie garden.
After our obligatory stop in the tea room/cafe we headed out to yet another cute village, Lower Slaughter. Gary had seen this village mentioned in a post on InstaGram by a Cotswold local (@wanderingbart) who said "if you like Bourton on the Water, you will love Lower Slaughter (similar but without so many tourists). Off we headed, because I don't want to miss any of the cute villages!!
This little village did not disappoint. This little stream ran through it. As far as we could see it was all residential, except for one large inn/pub. All the other businesses must be in it's neighboring village of Upper Slaughter, which we did not visit. This was really so lovely here, not crowded at all.
Walking, hiking, ambling, strolling...whatever you want to call it, it is super popular in England.
As I was standing on this bridge, I heard horse hooves...I turned around and sure enough, 4 horses with riders came up and crossed the stream and headed off on the other side.
We stopped in for tea at the lovely inn...they had a beautiful outdoor seating area next to the creek.
We saw some of these orange things when we parked and couldn't figure out what they were.
When we sat down for tea, we realized they were life preservers. The water in the stream was about 10-12 inches deep, so I think all these life preservers were a bit of over kill...but better safe than sorry, I guess!
After tea we headed home to Chipping Campden for one last night...we head to London the next morning. We have thoroughly loved our time in the Cotswolds and I am really really really sorry to be leaving. I told Gary I was having a crisis of confidence...I think I might love the English countryside more than the French countryside and that thought is shaking my whole belief system!!!
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