We braved the rain...

We always start with a good breakfast,
this time at Jo's on the A40 northbound at Whitchurch

It wasn't as bad as predicted where we went yesterday. We try go go out once a month with Mr and Mrs Bluefunnel. We all agree that a day out together is the best tonic we can have. They work so darned hard during the week and have so many calls on their time that it is important to get away once in a while, although Mr B can slip into sales mode as easy as taking a breath.

spelling mistakes always catch the eye

Mr M looking for a four leaf clover. What you can't
hear is him counting. 1,2,3,1,2,3,1,2,3.

For the scavenger hunt

Lower Brockhampton House

A glimpse of the Wye at Monmouth, just not flooding

We had decided to go to the Brockhampton Estate, a National Trust property just outside Bromyard in Herefordshire. It was the B's turn to drive so they picked us up around 8.30 and we headed for Monmouth and places north. We were going to have breakfast at Jo's place. It used to be a little chef many moons ago and then it always looked closed even though it might not have been. Then we noticed that there was a new sign so we stopped to have a cuppa one day and liked how clean it was so we had a breakfast. We are now confirmed customers and we highly recommend it to everyone. We took Pete there when we were going to Coventry for the Weeding last November and he agreed with us. The Bluefunnels love it too and they stop there if ever they are heading up the A40. From there we went to The Hop Pocket near Ledbury. Actually it is Bishop's Frome. We didn't realise until we got there that we had been before. Mrs B likes to shop but not your designer shopping she likes handmade quirky craft stuff and she shops all year to find that special present for people for Christmas. She loves Christmas.
WE noticed the notice outside the Butcher shop at the Hop Pocket. we didn't go in and tell them we just took pictures

The SatNav decided that the place we really wanted to be was Brockhampton Care home so it took us ten miles out of our way and this meant ten extra miles of Mr Blue complaining and telling the lady inside the SatNav to shut up because she didn't know what she was talking about.

One of the first things we saw at Brockhampton wass the sign for the nature trail. The rain was holding off although we had driven through several flooded lanes on our travels. This was fine because Mr and Mrs B have done the Landrover experience with Landrover so driving their Discovery through a flooded bit of lane was a doddle. Because of the saturated nature of the nature trail......... who am I kidding, we don't do walking, Mr M's knees don't allow it and Mr and Mrs Blue both have knees awaiting surgery.

Lower Brockhampton House is a delight. because the owners built themselves a newer, more fashionable house further up the hill in the 1700s the old house was used as a farm house and wasn't modernised or messed with at all so it still retains a lot of the original timber and stuff from when it was built around 1430 something. It has the remains of a moat, a gatehouse that was built in Tudor times lots of red brick outbuildings that were built during Stuart times and later and even though it is small it is well worth a visit.

We then came home because Mrs Blue remembered that she had to get things for dinner that night and I could feel The Cold beginning to take hold. Mr M has suffered with it all week now it seems to have caught me.
I managed one quick snap of the River Wye at Monmouth as we sped along. It is still below the top of the banks but it won't take much more rain in the next day or two to push it up. Fortunately we seem to be having mostly sun today. So that's a relief