Heale House, Salisbury and Stourhead

On our first full day in Somerset, we headed east toward Salisbury, and visited Heale House, the city of Salisbury itself, and then Stourhead Landscape Garden.  These first few pictures are of Heale House, which is still privately owned and occupied.  It is a beautiful, relatively small garden, which is currently being renovated and restored by the owners.  Because of its age and the fact that it has been in the same family for so many years, it has a real softness to it, that I can only relate to some of the grand old homes in Charleston.

The lavender borders went on forever, now accentuated with camellia standards and boxwood.

The anemones against the ancient walls were just stunning! 

This lawn ornament shows that there are certain things one just can't rush!

From Heale House, we went into Salisbury itself, which is the city from which my mother's ancestors emigrated in the early 1600's.  It's a fairly sizable city now, but still retains so much of its Tudor architecture.

                             
Since Atlanta is the headquarters of "tear it down if it's more than 30 years old," it was great to see these buildings still used as stores some 500 years after they were built.

Salisbury's real claim to fame is the cathedral with the tallest spire in England, and I loved the fact that the grounds were decorated with very contemporary sculptures like the one below.

The Cloisters of the Cathedral, below. 

We next went on to Stourhead, which will get a post of its own, since it falls into the "OMG" category!