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Sunday 29 May 2011

Wentworth Castle & Gardens

When Andy and I were in Scotland we started thinking about all the great days out that were on our own door step. You know? We think nothing of driving a few hundred miles to go see a Scottish castle or public gardens - yet we have an abundance of things like that here in Yorkshire! So when we came home we decided to make a point of visiting some of Yorkshire's own attractions and began our quest to find cheap days out locally. Unfortunately we weren't able to make good use of any discounts as the best discounts (in fact the ONLY discounts I could find) were for families...which is usually the case here. Anyway...I'm digressing....

So today we arrived at Wentworth Castle & Gardens - a large estate which thanks to English Heritage is now mostly open to the public. The estate is 50 acres and is actually mainly open to the public free of charge (although you do have to pay £3 parking fees). However, we chose to pay £4.95 each which allowed us entry in to the Victorian flower garden and other landscaped & oriental gardens (an includes the parking fee too). Personally I did think it was a little on the expensive side, as with all English Heritage sites in my opinion, but I have no doubt that the maintenance charges on this place must be astronomical!

You can find out more about Wentworth Castle and gardens here, but the main thing to realise when you see the photos is that it isn't actually a defensive medieval castle (like you'd normally think of when you hear the word castle) so much as a large country house. Also, the castle like structure in the photos is actually a "folly" which is what rich people of the past used to build in order to show their wealth. Follies are all over the world but here in the UK they're (almost) on every street corner*

*Possibly a slight over exaggeration

Anyway, enjoy the pics of my little slice of Yorkshire :)


This beautiful Victorian conservatory is currently being restored
Victorian flower garden
views of Yorkshire
the old public road used to enter the estate here
some monument
a folly - built for the kids to play in!
grounds at the back of the folly
Lady Lucy's Walk - Lucy was one of the owner's children and was said to have died of a broken heart as she couldn't marry the person that she loved. She is said to haunt this lime tree walk...no we didn't see her.

3 comments:

Tonya @ The Traveling Praters said...

Beautiful! Can I come visit? lol Your pictures are awesome.

Congratulations on your acceptance to university!

Anonymous said...

Those photo's are amazing! Me and my partner have always been the same when it comes to visiting places. Spending weekends in Scotland and Wales, visiting waterfalls and caves. However, there really are great places locally to go out and spend a few days out in Yorkshire.

We recently visited Hornsea Freeport, which is literally a half hour drive from where we live. Such an exciting place and under rated Seaside resort town with which I may add, sell THE BEST Fish and Chips I have ever had!

- Matthew

My Diabetic Sweet Life said...

Thanks Tonya - and of course you can visit us any time :)

Matthew - glad you liked the pics - we had a fab day out and are looking forward to loads of days out over the summer. Of course we won't hold our breath for good weather but, hey you can only get so wet! We went to Hornsea Freeport a few times when we lived near York but haven't been there since we moved near Leeds...might be worth going just for the fish & chips. In the 4 years we've lived here we haven't found a good chippy!

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