A week or so ago we visited Langley Park in Buckinghamshire. It has it own website at reference 2, from where the map above is lifted, and its own Wikipedia page at reference 3, but it can also be thought of as the southern extension of the Black Park country park we visited in November and noticed at reference 4 - on which occasion we failed to find any Wellingtonia. On this occasion I took care to identify Wellingtonia Ride running south from the main car park.
A park which was once a medieval hunting ground and was later attended to by Capability Brown.
After various vicissitudes, the house became a luxury hotel in the Marriott family. It all looks very grand at reference 5 and, at maybe five times what we paid at Denham Grove, completely out of our league.
On this occasion we took our morning drink & bun, from an overgrown shed at the north end of the car park, properly the Langley Park Tea Rooms of reference 6, part of the San Remo operation, an operation which specialises in catering in and around parks. It looks to be mainly north west London, but they also do Tooting Bec Common, much closer to home - and home to the famous Lido, a place we have used occasionally. It used to be quite a place on summer Sunday afternoons, with all sorts of sights and sounds. And smells.
One of the handsome trees near the car park. The park might have contained as many as a hundred of them, in the ride and elsewhere, but we did not have time to count them, thinking that a score of five was reasonable. Curiously, although there was a Wellingtonia Ride, horse riding was not permitted for some reason - and as it happened, we had the ride more or less to our ourselves.
The start of the ride, looking south from just by the car park. In this context, more woodland trees than ornamental, park trees, and we noticed that diameter at the base was not a very reliable indicator of height, although there was correlation.
Another view, from roughly the same spot.
A substantial oak which had been allowed to stand, rather than felling it to make way for the newcomers.
A snap which brings out the variation in size. On a much small scale, the beech trees at the bottom of our garden do something of the same sort: some have shot up, while some have remained in the shadows, as it were. I suppose, just as with people, it is, to some extent at least, a matter of lucky dip in the gene pool.
A different planting, looking, I think, towards the hotel.
Heading back towards the car park on a parallel path, getting mixed up with the rhododendrons.
A youngster, looking as if it could do with a bit more water than it was getting.
We took our picnic among the rhododendrons of Temple Gardens, a mass of colour on this occasion. We had been lucky with our timing, both as regards the weather and the season.
An outing for the telephone, which did a better job on this close-up of a rhododendron flower than it sometimes manages. Maybe not being a shiny yellow helps for some obscure optical reason.
BH thought that some rhododendrons go in for smell, but none of those that we tried did.
There was also a spot of tweeting, in the form of a kite flying low over the car park when we arrived. And a possible hornet when we got back to the car.
[Russia gas accounted for more than half of German gas imports before 2022 © Lisi Niesner/Reuters]
PS 1: I noticed the piece at reference 8 last evening. An elderly chartered accountant who once did time at Eton and who now does quality time devising cunning wheezes to help Russian oil to evade sanctions on its way to China and such like places. One of the chaps at it again. I wonder if he will be expelled by the Institute? On the grounds that they don't much mind what you get up to, but that does not include getting into the newspapers. Making the news is one thing, being the news is quite another. While this morning, I see from the piece at reference 9 that plenty of Germans would like to be at it too.
[Sheep cross the alpine pass "Hochjoch" at 2,856 meters above sea level, in the autonomous region of South Tyrol, Italy, June 9, 2018. Picture taken June 9, 2018. REUTERS/Lisi Niesner]
PS 2: Lisi Niesner appears to be quite versatile, despite not appearing to bother with her own website. This snap of high altitude sheep being lifted from the Irish Independent.
PS 3: Sunday: I learn from a correspondent that the Institute will indeed expel the old Etonian noticed above. The wheels may not turn very fast, but they will turn and he will have to drop the 'CA' handle from his business cards. He will also be disqualified from conducting certain kinds of business.
References
Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/05/wellingtonia-122.html.
Reference 2: https://countryparks.buckinghamshire.gov.uk/langley-park/.
Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langley_Park,_Buckinghamshire.
Reference 4: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2024/11/black-park.html.
Reference 5: https://www.marriott.com/en-gb/hotels/loniv-the-langley-a-luxury-collection-hotel-buckinghamshire/overview/.
Reference 6: http://langleyparktearooms.co.uk/.
Reference 7: http://sanremocatering.co.uk/.
Reference 8: UK imposes sanctions on British accountant over Russia shadow fleet deals: John Michael Ormerod was allegedly involved in the procurement of oil tankers - Tom Wilson, Financial Times - 2025.
Reference 9: Merz backs Nord Stream ban to prevent US and Russia restarting gas link: German chancellor worried about reigniting domestic row over Russian gas imports - Anne-Sylvaine Chassany, Henry Foy, Financial Times - 2025.
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