Trip to Greys Court, Henley

Hi. On Sunday we visited Greys Court, near Henley, for a walk. This is a National Trust property for which I pre-booked tickets at £8. each as we are not National Trust members. Even though we visited National Trust places about 5 times last year, we would have to go at least 7-8 times to break even on the joint membership price of £120. a year. So I think we’ll keep on paying ad hoc as and when needed. We would normally walk more locally to us in Windsor Great Park but since the first lockdown it has become unbearably crowded both from a parking and a walking point of view. We stopped going at the weekends and now we’ve pretty much stopped going there at all; it’s just too popular.

It was our first time to Greys Court and we were not disappointed. The National Trust places can look busy on arrival in the car park, but they obviously don’t oversell the tickets as we’ve always felt there is plenty of space for us for walking, not on top of others. The lady at the ticket office helpfully recommended us to do the Estate walk around the perimeter as this would be less crowded than the inner walk which was busy with children doing a nature trail. This was great advice and, after stopping for a pasty (ok but a bit hard/dry) and a drink at the café, we had a lovely walk through woods and fields.

View from the café. Look at that blue sky 🙂!

Amazing crocuses. Like 🍳 fried eggs.

Some primroses too.

Such tall trees in the woods, mainly ash, I love them.

Isn’t this one beautiful? I think they coppice them to encourage healthy growth and form this shape with multiple trunks.

The views started opening up. Some of this walk is part of the Chilterns Way which you can access for free.

Some bluebells, not the best carpet of them, but pretty nonetheless.

This way back! Don’t get lost.

Interesting fungi on some fallen trunks.

Would you like one more tree….? Oh, alright then.

So overall we had a great visit and we’d go again. It only took 30 minutes to get home although about 40 minutes getting there due to traffic. We drove through Henley town centre which was looking resplendent in the sunshine by the river. We spotted many nice looking pubs and restaurants and commented that even though it’s only 30 minutes from home it might be fun to do a weekend break there sometime when the hotels are open again.

A combination of my first two days back at work and a 2 hour meeting with our financial adviser this morning about savings and pensions 😴has left me rather tired. I had plans to do lots of things on my day off today especially out in the garden, but they’ll have to wait for another time. Inside my birthday flowers are looking super gorgeous now, don’t you think?

Back soon. Have a good rest of the week everybody! Xx