Chapel of St Mary The Virgin in Clumber Park

As we visited Clumber Park in Nottinghamshire owned by the National Trust, the dark clouds hung ominously over the chapel. The Chapel of St Mary the Virgin is actually the third one at Clumber Park. The first one was sadly destroyed by fire. The second, which had been started by the 6th Duke of Newcastle, was structurally unsound, so the build was abandoned after his death. SourceThe chapel you see today is the third. You could say, third time lucky.

As the dark clouds disappeared, the chapel looked totally different. It wasn't as demonic looking, especially with the daffodils in full bloom.

We took a nice leisurely stroll through the trees, keeping an eye on the weather as we went along.

A couple of swans were swimming gracefully towards the ornamental bridge along the river.

We stopped to give the ducks some food. It's still quite cold so you have to look after the birdies.

We called in at the rather large greenhouse/glasshouse. It was good to see signs of spring in there, with the lillies and wild daffodils.

The estate grows and sells their own produce here. Some of the items will also be used in their cafés. It made me think back to when I was a child how much people used to forage for food back then. We always came back with blackberries, raspberries, gooseberries, bilberries, and apples. Sometimes, the apples were scrumped (pinched), but that's another story. I hardly see anyone picking blackberries now or any kid up a tree pinching apples.

Some of the rooms have been turned into a museum where you can see a collection of old gardening tools. I can remember my dad using some of them when I was a kid. Perhaps, I ought to be in the museum as well??

It was at this point we called it a day as we could see the rain coming down in the distance.