Dockstract

After a gloriously sunny morning at home (I filled up the birdfeeders and got on with a couple of things) we set off for Twigworth, not far from Gloucester, the home of a place called Nature in Art, which is a sort of museum. I hadn't been there for 20 years, and had it in mind to visit a National Trust property, not realising that the vast majority are closed at this time of year. Shame!

The Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition was on display: really stunning, but it was too crowded to really admire the photos, and to be honest I would have preferred to see them in a large gallery with white walls and lots of space and light. However, the house (Wallsworth Hall) and gardens of Nature in Art are pretty spectacular, and we enjoyed walking round the grounds, taking photos (on all the wrong settings, in my case!) and visiting the resident artist, Henk, in his studio. CleanSteve has blipped him and his set-up.

Afterwards, I wanted a coffee at the Quays in Gloucester. This is the end of the historic docks that has been redeveloped as a shopping, leisure and living space. My fantasy about sitiing outside an Italian cafe fell a bit flat when I realised that the Italian cafes were not by the water at all, and the last time I'd had a flat white there, I'd felt very sick afterwards (too much milk!) So we went to Nero, where I didn't feel sick after a fabulous hot chocolate. We saw an All Saints handbag shop nearby with about a hundred old black-and-gold Singer sewing machines in the window: amazing! CleanSteve has posted an image in flickr, linked to his blip today.

This is an abstract of a paddle wheel and some old warehouse reflections: actually Llanthony warehouse, which is home to the National Waterways museum. Gloucester docks and the warehouses had their heyday in Victorian times, when grain and other cargo was transported up the Severn, and later via the Gloucester and Sharpness canal, to the Midlands and beyond. Coal from the Midlands was exported via the canal network to the sea.

Gloucester docks is Britain's most inland docks, and though the port ceased to be viable in the 1960s, tall ships still come here to be repaired in dry dock at at a yard located in the docks complex. I have blipped the annual Tall Ships Festival before.