A colt foal

After our busy afternoon gardening we finished Dani and Sooty before laying the table for the morning and we where about to have supper. But there was a storm brewing outside with a gathering wind and so we decided to get the brood mares and their foals in early to go to bed.

Firstly Diva with her filly foal Aime and then Belle and Dolly who live together in one block and when they were all settled nicely we went to the next field for Lizzie with her filly Annie and the very pregnant April...........................but there were four!!

April was nuzzling the most gorgeous chestnut colt foal that was only an hour or two old. Charles guided the little fellow in and mum April was soon tucking into her super..............just as she'd planned.

Gardening in July

A day Lilly

Crocosmia Lucifer

We spent the afternoon pottering around the garden, dodging the sudden squally showers with a tactical retreat to the garden room before venturing out five minutes later to be rewarded by dazzlingly brilliant sunshine. We found the garden illuminated as never before as each raindrop magnified the light and made the colours more brilliant.

The terrace leads on to the sun dial garden

The sheltered terrace in front of the garden room with its waiting sun loungers and self seeded Agapanthus amongst the pots of Box



The Italian Garden that Charles mowed today for the first time since June

A vivid yellow crocosmia that I bought from Lower Kennegy Nurseries

Statue of an Angel by Annie Henry

One of the lawns leading to a wilder part of the garden below a distant view to the hills that separate Penzance from St Ives

Ollie's summer evening

Olly has had a wonderful summer down here in Cornwall. He moved out of the house without a backward glance as the long hot days set in and promptly set up home under a Date Palm in the car park. There he could just be glimpsed each day with his tell tale white paws and pink nose slightly protruding from the under planting of grasses. As you can see he has "summered rather well" spending his days with just a quick commute over to the stables to refuel on his favourite cat meat before another short nap or a little socialising with passing guests.

With the change in the weather he has had a rethink and landed with a resounding !plop! in the Dining room after a gargantuan effort to clear the open stable door and said "I may come in for a while"..........and so he has, snoozing on unsuspected patches of carpet in the sudden pools of sunshine before judging finely the best times to go off on cat patrol.

Last night was no exception, in a burst of hot evening sunshine I spotted him lounging on the flight of granite steps outside of the Blue and Apricot room - naturally he marched off with all of the perversity of a cat at the sight of the camera.

.......................So i picked him up and parked him in the correct spot but as they say "you can lead a horse to water but not make him drink" or to put it another way "you can put a cat in pose for a camera but not make him smile!"

Some pictures from early June that I didn't post when the computer was dead!

Gardens to Courtyard

Dani's dressage

The weather proved fickle this weekend after the scorching time we have had but the occasional shower didn't spoil our outing to St Piran's stud in Perranuthnoe to attend a dressage clinic with Peter Madison Greenwell.

Dani, our Spanish stallion is a familiar sight hacking through Perranuthnoe and the surrounding countryside with his friend Sootty and spends the rest of his days carefully watching the comings and goings of our guests through his liquid brown eyes from his stable overlooking the car park.

April is nearing her time now and so Sooty has "gentlemanly" given up his big stable for her for the time being and we are once again monitoring her through the night on the stable camera - we think about a week before the trans continental stork comes to call for the last time this year - Charles is hoping for a boy!

walking to a Cornish cove

I wondered if this should really be headed Christine and Charles day out, for after the hectic preparations for the garden opening we felt the need to visit "our cove" again. Hidden behind the Tamarisk on the coastal footpath east of the farm we have a favourite cove that we used to like to visit in the days that our dog was with us (or the the shade of the sea caves for him) but today we were alone with no excited lurcher barking at the sight of the back pack.


We set off across the back of the farm on the public footpath that leads to Trebarvah before dropping down onto the ancient gorse flanked track that cuts the corner off to reach the coast pausing in the farmyard above Perranuthnoe to admire the strange misty light strouding Mounts Bay.



The strange light over Mounts bay from Trebarvah

Charles carrying the pack down through the gorse

One of the many caterpillars that always cross the wide dusty track just there ( sadly we saw him squashed on the way home)

When we reached the cove the swell that we had heard the night before when sitting in the Italian Garden late into the dusk, was still running, with rolling lines of waves forging across the cove - thrashing across the tranquil sea pools of low tide where I had learnt to swim many balmy summers ago.




An eddy below us as we waited for the tide to fall enough to expose our beach

We waited for half an hour beyond high tide before finally Charles set off as the strongest swimmer to see if there was any sand exposed on the little beach backed by a sea cave. He returned to say there was a good corner for our picnic, before floating the back pack in front of him wrapped in a bin bag through the waves and I had only to follow.........rather dubiously!

We swam from the rocks to the little secret beach

I arrived like a piece of flotsam carried by the waves to the shore to spend a day of utter tranquility soothed by the rhythm of the sea and I'm ashamed to say i slept for most of the day but did spend some time idly watching a crabber collecting his pots across the cove and a sailing boat tacking away before the seal arrived to bob curiously peering at us on his beach.

By four o' clock the tide had dropped enough for us to walk back across to climb the cliff out of the cove before making our way back, climbing the footpath in the increasingly intense heat, through the familiar landscape, of the well trodden path across the fields until we emerged on to Ednovean lane to find Olley with a cats economy of effort still........................





Olley happily sleeping in the car park ah well it's a cats life!

Perranuthnoe open gardens

The horses feet rattled on the tarmac road as we crept down through Perranuthnoe village as quietly as we could at half past five on Sunday morning as the village slept. With the day of the garden opening waiting for us it was the only possible time for their daily exercise and we didn't meet a soul as we climbed the cliff path out of Perranuthnoe towards the hamlet of Trebarvah before crossing the A394 and looping back through Goldsithney towards home in time to cook our Guest breakfast

The morning was spent in frantic activity trying to secure errant gate numbers to the appropriate openings and open the front field up ready for the car parking for the day. We must thank Terry, Sue and Bryan for valiantly parking nearly one hundred cars in straight lines and welcoming everyone that had came to enjoy the day.

Our impromptu car park

Alas i didn't get to visit any of the other gardens on the day but everyone I met looked very happy and welcome to all our blog readers - it was a real pleasure and great surprise to meet so many of the blog reading community. (Perran lady your echiums await!)

Yvonne phoned with the news that..............!!

£1876.80

Had been raised for the church room which was a fantastic result for the day

Garden visitor arriving



We settled for super in the Italian garden that felt strangely still after all of the visors of the day
That's Yvonne (tireless organiser) and her brother Graeme (Passport seller)in the foreground, two of our neighbours and fellow garden openers Charlie and Jan, Two of our house guest, my brother Bryan (painter of the car park sign and Parker) and Sue who worked tirelessly all day. Charles is behind the camera as usual so that just leaves me (doesn't think of a good enough excuse quickly enough!) All posing..........




and not looking at the camera

It would have been nice to sit late into the night with the candles flickering within the dusky enclosures but Alas another day beckoned and we crept silently to bed to start again tomorrow

(although I swear i won't garden at all this week!)

I was allowed to cut the box topiary on the terrace

Naturally as Sunday was overcast we woke today to brilliant sunshine that cast sharp shadow in the gravel border with the clearest blue sky over head but that is another day!