Castle Howard

Arrived at Castle Howard, which is in Yorkshire, north west of Nottingham, at 12.00noon so after a lovely walk through gardens to the Castle we had lunch in the Castle cafe before touring in earnest.

Castle Howard has been home to the Howard family since it was built over 300 years ago. Successive generations have welcomed visitors and it is this continuing support from visitors that enables the endless tasks of renovations and restorations. It has also been hired for use by many filmmakers including Brideshead Revisited, Bridgerton and Death Comes to Pemberley.

It houses beautiful paintings, tapestries, porcelain, sculptures etc. The gardens are vast with water features and amazing sculptures. There is a huge walled garden with espaliered fruit trees, picking flower garden rooms, kitchen garden including herbs and vegetables.
One of the standouts was the Atlas Fountain erected on the South Parterre in the 1850’s.

Castle Howard is about 15 minutes drive from the BnB we are staying in for the next three nights. It is in a village called Stillington. This gorgeous BnB accommodation is called 'Pocket Cottage'. It is small but perfectly formed. Attention to detail is first class and cannot fault anything. Lots of interesting things put together in a most tasteful, if quirky, way.

We decided on a local pub for dinner and went to the nearby village of Crayke and dined at The Durham Ox. It was like an upmarket, slightly larger Tatong Tavern. Tuesday night and booked out but they had one table for two left.

The fish pie we both had was delicious - so much so we booked in for tomorrow night too. The crepes were perfection.Read more