Castle Howard, July 23, 2013

Today I was off on my own again, after breakfast with Marthe at a lovely small cafe where I had Moroccan mint tea and a scone, both of which were very good. Then I left Marthe reading a magazine while I trotted off to a third bus station in York called Piccadilly. I had no trouble finding it, as it was next to a Marks and Spencer department store. Caught a 181 bus at 11:00, which arrived at Castle Howard at 11:58. The castle is in the Howardian Hills, 15 miles NE of York. It is one of England's stateliest homes, and I was anxious to see it. The main house was designed in 1699 by Sir John Vanbrugh, which was odd because he was best known as a playwright with no formal architectural training. His only qualification seems to have been membership in the same gentlemen's club as Charles Howard, 3rd Earl of Carlisle, for whom the house was built. Vanbrugh recognized his limitations and called in Nicholas Hawksmoor. The pair went on to collaborate on Blenheim Palace as well. Hawksmoor's guiding hand can be seen, but so can Vanbrugh's in the theatricality of the building, especially the palatial Great Hall. Other rooms in endless succession are filled with porcelain, Roman statuary, furniture by Sheraton and Chippendale, paintings by Veronese, Gainsborough, van Dyck, and Rubens, as well as objets d'art, friezes, and pilasters. I went to the house last, as I wanted to see the gardens first and experience how they set the stage, so to speak, for the house. I went through the stable courtyard, purchased my ticket, and then went to see the Walled Garden, the Rose Collection, and the Ornamental Vegetable Garden, all three of which were exquisite. From there I proceeded to the Atlas Fountain, which is where you finally get a full view of the house, with east and west wings and a central Great Hall. In 1940, the West Wing almost burned to the ground, and to this day restoration is proceeding slowly but surely. A little more on that later. Following a viewing of Atlas holding up the world and surrounded by four male figures blowing horns (a very impressive fountain which ties all surrounding sections of the castle grounds together), I was off to the South Lake and Prince of Wales Fountain, the New River Bridge and the Mausoleum, the Temple of the Four Winds, and then took a saunter through the beautiful Ray Woods. Coming out of the woods, you are then on a direct axis with the front of the house--the W wing, which had been so badly burned and is under restoration. There were two exhibits on the ground floor of the building that were of great interest to me--one on the building of Castle Howard and one on the women of Castle Howard--both those who married the various earls of Carlisle and those women who served as servants on the estate. Then I toured the inside of the house, where two rooms in the burned wing were devoted to the filming of "Brideshead Revisited" in both the 1970s and the 1990s. I am sure that income generated by those filmings is very welcome to the refurbishing and maintenance of the house and grounds. After the house tour, and by this time it was 3:00, I was hungry and decided to have some lunch at a cafe in the stable house--a fabulous carrot and courgette soup and bread. Afterwards, I had a wonderful raspberry ice cream and strolled a bit more before catching the 4:50 back to York, arriving at 5:50 and back at the hotel shortly thereafter. Currently, I am enjoying a cup of tea and a shortbread, writing this blog, and watching the breaking news of Kate Middleton and WWWilliam coming out of a London hospital with their new baby son. Cause for celebration!