I Wish All Days Were Like This

Today was another lovely day. The sun was shining, my patio was blooming, so Charles made us a breakfast of fried eggs, sugared strawberries and a fruit tart and served it to me out on the patio. How perfect is he?!

Next stop was Richmond, for Danieli's ice cream. If you have never experienced this then I tell you "Go now!" It is the best tasting ice cream in the whole history of my stomach! I had a scoop of cherry ice cream with whole cherries in it, and a scoop of real pistachio - creamy, tasty, mmmmm!

But the biggest treat of our day was still to come. We had booked a night in a hotel near where I work, a creaky old 16th century building with beautiful gardens and ghosts in the woodwork. We arrived at the hotel and Charles, bless him, pulled his pyjamas out of the car boot and was going to carry them inside just like that - looking like an armful of laundry! I hurriedly thrust a carrier bag at him so that he had something to put them in, which was just as well, as our bags were carried upstairs from Reception by the hotel porter, and I'm fairly sure he has never been given an armful of laundry to take to someone's room before! Even so, he looked a little confused at being handed a carrier bag by Charles and a cloth carrier bag by me - no suitcases!

Our room - oh my god, our room! It was fabulous! It was large, with the most enormously wide bed that we could both sprawl out on and barely even touch each others fingers together. There were even secret cupboards. I opened one cupboard to find a walk in area with nothing in it. But I walked in anyway - to find another huge cupboard inside the cupboard. This I hid in and called Charles.

"Come in here a minute!"

In he walked.

"Huh? Where are you?"

He walked out again. I found that hilarious! God I'm such a child!

Another cupboard opened up to produce a television, yet another one produced an entire bathroom! The wallpaper was gorgeous. It was filled with pictures of birds and butterflies and bees, all intertwined with branches and blooming flowers. We lay on the bed and stared at it for ages, losing ourselves in the pictures.

Then it was time to explore the gardens. These were styled like a knot garden, with shaped trees and little shaped hedges. There was a stream with a little arched footbridge crossing it and blossoming trees dropping their petals onto the bridge. On the other side of the bridge there was another, circular garden with seats to rest in and a fountain in the middle. And there was a more natural area with a lake and some swans, which stretched into the distance. We even came across a little outdoor swimming pool (although it was closed) which had wonderfully old-fashioned wooden changing cubicles alongside it.

After a happy couple of hours wandering outside we went back to our room to change for dinner. Woo, they did things properly here! The dining room had gentle classical background music, all the waiters were French and very attentive, the menu was scarily expensive... I loved it! And oh my god, the food! Every bite was heavenly quality, just perfect! In spite of the expense, I think I will come back and eat here again every time I feel in need of a real treat!

After dinner we wandered the gardens again in the dark. We found a little Summer house with seats outside it, and sat peacefully chatting for ages. Eventually we were driven in by the thought that they might lock the hotel doors and leave us outside, otherwise we'd still be there now!

What a heavenly day!