Heading west again (part 1)

Headed west once again last week, quite by chance picking up the marker for Athelhampton House, dropped at reference 1, something over three years ago now.

BH had heard all kinds of stories about traffic jams on roads to the west country, with monster jams on places like the M25 and the A303 at Stonehenge - this past being the place where the legal eagles have blocked government policy on the grounds (I think) that insufficient attention had been given to heritage matters. I don't agree with the policy because I think tunnels are too expensive, but I also thought that the whole point of spending some huge amount of money was heritage. Legal eagles getting a bit big for their boots. That being as it may be, we decided on an 07:30 start, the sort of early start we have not troubled ourselves with for many years. 

Join the A3 at Esher, turn right across the Hog's Back at Guildford, short stretch on the M3, then turn left to Salisbury at Andover, Blandford Forum (this being a mistake on the Salisbury ring road), Dorchester and so on to Axminster. Not much traffic on most of this route, and nothing so grand as a traffic jam. The only bad thing on the road was the number of people driving with dipped headlights in broad daylight which I find visually irritating. A slightly bad thing was the absence of a No.36 among the scattering of 30's.

A short stop off on a lay-by left over from a bit of road straightening on the A354. It seemed a rather odd place for a footpath to start. Fair bit of unsightly litter too. Irritated that I cannot now find this lay-by, despite inspection of post, despite inspection of both gmaps and Ordnance Survey. And the entertaining reference 6.

All of which meant that we indulged in a stop-off at Athelhampton House of reference 2, presently open all week and owned by one Giles Keating, an internationally recognized thought leader and market commentator who has spent serious time at Credit Suisse. Before that time at the Confederation of British Industry, the London Business School, the London School of Economics (mathematical economics) and St. Catherine’s College, Oxford (philosophy). Not clear whether the purchase money was inherited or salary, but I dare say his salary at the bank is of the order of £1m a year, so he should have been able to do some serious saving. The house has been lived in fairly recently, but I don't think he does. Perhaps he has some gardener's cottage in some quiet part of the estate and a town house for the winter.

A handsome plantain in the car park. 

An Indian Bean Tree at the entrance, in full bean. Rather smaller than runner beans, but sadly too high up to pick one and it seemed a bit cheeky to ask to borrow some steps. A tree last noticed at reference 7. Through the entrance to find that what had been a stable yard or some such had been roofed over in glass (or perhaps some kind of plastic) to make space for a licensed cafeteria. I dare say that they have problems with heat, light and ventilation when it is hot, as they do in the similar, if rather larger, cafeteria at Denbigh's, near Dorking. But it was not hot on this day so we took tea and apple cake. 

The house is very old, substantially modified over the years (to the point of having 13 amp sockets), but there is still plenty of old structure, fixtures and fittings to be seen. Including the full-on dovecote snapped above. Perhaps it is just as well that I did not think to ask the young people working the cafeteria whether they did the occasional pigeon pie.

Including a lot of books, quite a lot of them quite recent. But the bookcases were all full and we suspected purchase by the yard, or possibly the cubic yard, to fill them up. In which connection an edition of Hansard (or some such) bound in blue, extending to hundreds of volumes and probably chucked out by some department of government, was very useful. But no Clarissa.

The unusual roof to the hall. The ticket said very old, touched up more recently, but it all looked fairly new to me. Settle for most of it being 150 years old?

A very old table, with the bases of the legs tied together for extra strength. Not something which is usually done these days. I thought the ties were old enough, but that the angles and facings were later additions - one catch with such ties being that people are going to kick them around a bit as they eat and drink.

This copper bath prompted an interesting discussion with another visitor, possibly someone who knew something about working with metal. We were both very impressed with the quality and finish of the work - and the time it took us to find the joins, one running down each corner. Don't suppose I would care to pay what such a thing would cost now, even if we had a suitable space to put it in. Other than the garden that is.

A striking lock, even if the top part and the bottom part were not originally paired in this way. I was reminded of Hampton Court Palace - and of the story that Henry VIII used to include locks and locksmith in his baggage, so that he could lock his doors when assigned lodgings on his travels. Presumably surface mounted locks not that unlike this one. Clearly a chap who was security conscious.

A striking bit of stairwell carpentry, even if I could not hold the camera straight.

A striking bit of art done at Cannes in 1936 by a former chatelaine, one Marevna. Otherwise Marie Vorobieff, a Russian artist who spent quality time in Paris in the early part of the twentieth century, with lots of very arty friends, and who eventually settled down for a while in Dorset with her second husband, Rodney Phillips. She lived to be more than 90, but, sadly, died in relative poverty and obscurity, in London, in 1984. See reference 8.

A portrait of the artist, executed in 1915 by her then lover, the Mexican painter, Diego Rivera. The original travels around but appears to be owned by the Banco de México Diego Rivera Frida Kahlo Museums Trust. Or perhaps the Alfred Stieglitz Collection, gift of Georgia O'Keeffe. This last being a lady noticed for a second time at reference 9. And one of her paintings of what we regard as weeds at reference 10.

To be continued in Part 2.

References

Reference 1: http://psmv3.blogspot.com/2018/05/heading-west.html.

Reference 2: https://www.athelhampton.com/.

Reference 3: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/08/wellingtonia-37.html.

Reference 4: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/08/fake-123.html.

Reference 5: https://highwaysengland.citizenspace.com/he/a303-stonehenge-2018/supporting_documents/Digital%20consultation%20booklet_v2.pdf. Quite by chance today, I came across this accessible booklet about the Stonehenge tunnel. Three years old now, so possibly a little out of date.

Reference 6: https://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/. The Society for All British and Irish Road Enthusiasts. 'The A354 is a 53 mile long primary road that runs southwest between Salisbury and the coast at Weymouth and Portland. Formerly the main road from the Channel port towards London. Its route has barely changed in over two centuries, as can be seen with almost every 18th-century milestone still at the road’s edge, still readable at 60 mph'.

Reference 7: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2021/07/indian-bean-tree.html.

Reference 8: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Vorobieff.

Reference 9: http://psmv3.blogspot.com/2016/08/made-it.html.

Reference 10: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2016/03/the-full-monty.html.

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