Wilton House - and Palladian Bridge

Thursday 24th July

In temperatures that made any travelling most discouraging, I suddenly had the thought of visiting my local Stately Home, the big and rather fabulous Wilton House, residency to the Earl of Pembroke (who actually is quite young and seems to be a nice bloke too!). The house has been used in quite a few period drama films too.

Wikipedia

Four pounds in bus fare and four miles later and another six pounds, just to get into the stately Grounds. I would have needed another seven pounds to go into the big House too. But it was the manicured and pleasurable grounds, with the River Nadder running through it - and the wonderful Paladian bridge that spans it that was the draw for me, on such a hot summer's day.

Such a pity that volunteers who staff the entrance don't know how to operate the computerised tills and so the woman in front of me - on her way out - took fifteen minutes to pay for the awful souvenir nick-knack she must have though inseparable. I was just standing there, soaked in sweat, itching to devour the "picnic" I had just bought from the town's mini supermarket. The other volunteer was on the phone for this entire period.

Yes, I should be more patient but sometimes you just want to slam down the exact cash you already have in your hot little hand and escape!

Anyway, once out in the gardens and there were kids, children and lots of them. It was like a VERY posh playground! But there were smatterings of little groups reading books under cedar trees and...

...well, Wilton House stages a big - and amazing - Motor Show in mid August. The last I went to was brilliant, sunny hot and millions of pounds worth of cars, vintage but mostly supercars. Driving slowly round these picturesque grounds.

Already, they had put up a temporary 'bridge' over the river, all scaffolded and ugly, with bright orange netting to stop folks from trying to cross it. This bridge will join the parkland area north of the river (not accessible to the public) with the main House and gardens for the big day.

I wanted a different picture to what I had from other visits to Wilton House as my Blip. Took the usual ones of the beautiful and ornate Palladian bridge, which you cannot actually walk on. A buzzing noisy sit-on mower and man upon it kept looking over at me to make sure I didn't jump over the ferocious looking rope!

I then got the idea to get both Palladian bridge AND big House in the same ultra-wideangle shot. I'd left the fisheye at home and the widest on the Nikkor 10-24mm (used here) wasn't wide enough.

So, it was off with trainers and socks and a little wade was in order. Water was a lovely cool temperature, the gravelly river bed with lots of slippery slime covered pebbles were not!

I probably should have waded in further - the river levels quite low meant that it was now or never to get this shot, but as soon as I knew I had something, I waded back in onto the bank.

It was now three o'clock and so the sun was now behind the Bridge and so put it in shadow. The pleasant greens and blue sky were just a bit ordinary for me in the end and so a black and white came my task. A lot of editing, including correcting the leaning-over-backwards wide angle perspective. Not infrared but a polariser.

Not for everybody and certainly not for those elderly ladies volunteering at those tills, but for me. My version.

Nice afternoon, could have been nicer - little boys (without parents) whacking all the flowers with sticks in the Chinese Garden saddened me, for instance and having to leave by 5pm, when one knows how much nicer it would all get later on in the day.

Don't let what I say put you off from visiting Wilton House though. The State Rooms and van Dyke paintings make it one of the finest Houses in England. I'd done the inside with my friend Des a good few years ago. And, end of July in school holidays is never going to be the best time to visit either, is it?

Thanks to all for helping get my glowing sunset Blip of yesterday up into the Spotlights

It's the New Forest and Hampshire Show near Brockenhurst in a few hours - today, the 30th - a huge 100,000 visitors over 3 days that I haven't had the chance to visit since childhood, where we went every year then as my mother showed pedigree Daschunds and one year, did well enough to qualify for Crufts! Involves train journeys and much cash to get in but am really looking forward to it.