An Englishman's Home... Family life in an English castle

An imperfect year

2011-12-31T23:12:00.003Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

We might all do well, as 2011 turns to 2012 to remember that our constant search for perfection is in vain.

If world events have taught us anything this year it is surely that we all inhabit an imperfect world and we should spend a little more time recognising the joy in what is around us than searching for something that isn't there.

For my part I can tell you that my new year's resolutions include not expecting miracles from my staff, not to expect miracles from my wife (although that she puts up with me is miraculous in itself) not expecting my children to be perfectly behaved all the time and to stop expecting to see the body of a twenty year old each time I look in the mirror. If I can get to grips with those I shall be a more contented person.

At Augill Castle it has been, on the whole, a good year but it has been far from perfect. Business has held up and we have managed to make several improvements to the fabric of the castle and to the services we offer.

There are galley kitchens for guests to use which seem to have gone down well, I have redecorated six of our fourteen bedrooms and three bathrooms. We have landscaped the pond, started a small holding with pigs, goats, duck, hens & turkeys, started offering afternoon tea, held open air theatre in the garden (and on both occasions our prayers for perfect weather were answered) had Santa to visit and hosted Christmas for the first time in ten years.

We lost Harry our very naughty cat who might best be remembered for the time he started to demolish a wedding cake half way through the Groom's speech. And we lost Holly, our fourteen year old labrador who was so much a part of the very fabric of Augill. With her natural smile, constantly wagging tail and constant temperament she knew more about customer service than the rest of us ever will.

And, of course, we have had you, our guests.

There have been so many good comments and only a few adverse ones but, as is human nature, it is the bead ones that most people really want to hear about. So here is a run down of the year through the eyes and words of some of our guests.

In the Spring a couple of guests arrived and left within an hour. They telephoned the next day to ask for their deposit to be returned. When asked why they had left without explanation the reply went something like this: 'The rooms are shabby and dated, we were expected to eat at the same table as other guests and frankly it wasn't the luxury experience we were looking for. Furthermore, the drive was very well worn and (horror of horrors) there were children playing on the tennis court.'

Both the rooms to which they were shown have now been redecorated and the drive is under constant repair but as for the children... the manacles just won't hold and they keep getting out.

Hot on the heels of this disgruntled fellow came another hard to please couple.

'Frankly we're less than pleased with the room,' I was told on asking how they were settling in. 'There's no hot water.'

'How strange, may I come and check?' I asked without really waiting for a reply.

'I hardly think that necessary, we've been running the bath tap AND the shower for twenty minutes and there's just freezing cold water.'

I was already holding my hand under a steaming tap when the guest followed me in.

'Well,' he grumbled, 'the hot and cold are on the opposite sides to that in our house.'

'OK, is everything else alright with the room?'

By the end of May we'd enjoyed one of the sunniest and warmest springs on record. But this was lost on a group of four Americans who had booked for two nights but left after one. 'The castle just is not old enough,' was their main complaint, 'and there's no air conditioning.'

Perhaps a transatlantic language problem? In the US it's called air conditioning, in Cumbria it's called a window.

As summer set in the weather deteriorated and for a few this was, inevitably, our fault!
'The gardens were flooded, there was absolutely nothing to do and it was freezing cold,' they wailed, standing in nothing but T shirts. We did tell them to come by car but they insisted on the train from London and back in 24 hours. I should have offered to lend them jumpers.

One honeymooning couple declared, on being shown Pendragon, widely held as our most magnificent room, to be gloomy and oppressive. We invited them to find alternative accommodation and they ended up booking a room at a very traditional hotel in Bowness on Windermere whose speciality is coach parties of old ladies. Enough said.

We prepared for our two forays into open air theatre in July with trepidation. The summer weather had turned monsoonal but days before both Romeo & Juliet and Alice in Wonderland (complete with a Mad Hatter's tea party) the sun came out and shone through both performances. Each was a quintessentially English picnic-on-the-lawn experience under a crystal blue sky.

But someone wasn't happy. A local drama teacher apparently found the acting amateurish and the whole thing very unprofessional. Well the food and service wasn't unprofessional and she surely is a prime candidate for trying harder in 2012 to see the joy in just being.

By the end of the summer we'd had a stream of wonderful people to stay. Some returning after a decade or more, others returning for their second or third stay this year. The only gripe any of them seemed to have was with the weather which treated none of us kindly, unlike the press which gave us rave reviews in national newspapers, regional rags and glossy magazines.

We were not even knocked off the crest of our wave when the Daily Mail sent an undercover reporter who found things a little less to his liking, finding the castle too kitsch, objecting to our family photographs on the grand piano (was it the photos he didn't like or the fact we have room for a grand?) and feeling positively insulted by rickety Victorian windows and breadcrumbs in the butter dish.

Ironically, on the same Saturday The Daily Telegraph listed us as one of Europe's best places to spend Christmas and Tom Chesshyre from The Times stayed in the very same room as the Mail's anonymous reporter and said of his stay: 'Staying at Augill Castle is like entering a Gothic fantasy world (with posh toiletries and a very good cooked breakfast). What a lovely, friendly Gothic retreat.'

It's not perfect, this castle. It never will be and neither will we. No apologies for that. The thing is, our guests aren't perfect either so, on the whole, I think we all go together rather well most of the time.

One guest comment stands out from the rest this year: 'Perfectly imperfect'.

As we welcome in 2012 let's all cast aside the gloom and wish each other a more settled and optimistic year ahead and perhaps just expect a little less from each other.

Happy New Year.

The school Christmas play

2011-12-30T01:11:00.002Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastre.com

Anyone over the age of twelve (and that’s being generous) who admits to enjoying a pantomime is, in my opinion, nuts. There is, however, a facet of Christmas that fills me with even more dread than being dragged on stage by Widow Twanky (which she once did when I was the tender age of thirty five and which haunts me still).

The prep school Christmas production. It’s not so much the play itself, but the preparations...

“Dear parents/guardians,

Following the success of last year’s production of Tweeny Sid we have decided to be a little more adventurous and stage a production of The Lion King.

Children will be auditioning just after the half term holidays and once they have been assigned a part we will write to you again with suggestions for costumes.

Yours sincerely,

Miss Brightbutton.”

Words enough to strike fear in to the hardiest of parents’ hearts.

(Wait until she’s married with school-age children and see if it doesn’t morph into a simple heartwarming rendition of carols sung by the children in their own clothes lasting no more than fifteen minutes and rounded off with lashings of mulled wine.)

Tweeny Sid was a sanitised children’s version of the classic tale of a murderous Victorian barber in which Tweeny Sid was actually a chimney sweep whose black cat stole pies from a struggling pie shop owner... (I can’t recall the rest of the story but I felt well rested when I woke to a rousing ovation). Costumes were a cinch: Something drab and grey topped off with a flat cap and some dirt smudged on the children’s faces to make them look poor.

But The Lion King?! I ask Emily what part she is hoping for and she tells me she wants to be either of the two lionesses, Nala or Sarabi.

Excellent! I can visualise a lion’s outfit and don’t imagine it will be that difficult to knock up.

By the time of the auditions Emily has learnt every word of both parts and practised all the songs.

A week later she jumps into the car outside school and thrusts a letter into my chest. ‘We’ve been given our parts.’

"Dear parents/guardians,

Following our auditions for The Lion King ...Emily... has been selected to play the part of ...Rafiki the wise monkey and narrator of the story...

To help you with ideas enclosed are some pictures of costumes from the West End production of The Lion King.

We are not expecting costumes to be expensive or elaborate.

Please do let me know if you require any help.

Yours excitedly

Miss Brightbutton."

I catch a glimpse of Emily in the rear view mirror and she’s not happy. ‘I wanted to be a lion, not a monkey,’ she grumbles.

I remain encouraging, ‘well in the stage musical Rafiki is played by a woman and she’s the most important character as she holds the whole story together.

But I am not happy, and Wendy won’t be either. How the hell do we produce a decent looking multi-coloured monkey outfit knowing full well that some other parents will have taken the photos of the West End costumes as gospel and won't be happy until they have recreated an eight foot high giraffe on stilts? We feel better by reminding ourselves that there are also parents that will do what they can the night before with a sheet of crepe paper, a couple of toilet rolls and some packing tape.

Soon after we get home there’s a phone call.

‘Hi, it’s Cressida, Petal’s mum. Petal is going to be Zazu the hornbill in the show and we were thinking that because Wendy grew up in Africa you might be able to help us out with a costume.

What is she thinking? That we have a menagerie of African birds in the garden? The big five roaming the grounds?

‘Oh God, says Wendy as she cups her hand over the phone, ‘she’ll not be happy unless Petal is soaring above the rest of the cast on mechanical wings,' and she tells Cressida that we are too caught up with our own costume dilemma.

In the end we are rather proud of what we have come up with (with only a couple of passing references to the West End pictures) and as we make our way to the matinee performance of the show we are happy to parade Emily fully made up through the village. Emily is equally pleased since she realised that her part has more lines than anyone else and requires her to be on stage for the whole performance.

There are to be two performances of the show which hasn’t gone down well with some parents.

Lavinia, yummy mummy of Jonathan and Henry catches us in the street. ‘Wend, darling. Don’t you think two performances is just too much for the little ones. They’re going to be sooo tired.’

‘But Lav,’ replies Wendy, ‘last year you complained that an afternoon performance wasn’t good for working parents.’ Ironic, since Lavinia has never done a decent day’s work in her life.

Inside the village hall it’s mayhem. Mr Lovegood is trying to keep order but the gazelles are getting over excited, being chased by Lawrence, who has clearly been typecast as Scar, and the lionesses, played by twins Maisy and Bella are in a strop because Harry, who is playing Mustafa is actually dressed in a real pelt. Apparently his grandfather was a hunter in Kenya.

'It's gross,' they both spit but it's pure jealousy as their crepe paper manes, cardboard ears and yellow tights just don't compare. The were much better as street urchins last year, their dirty faces so convincing.

As everyone takes their seats Miss Brightbutton claps her hands and orders all the rats and spiders to gather at the front of the stage.

‘I don’t remember rats and spiders in the film,’ Oliver whispers to Wendy.

‘Oh you know they have to create parts for everyone. Remember last year the street urchins outnumbered everyone else by two to one and the year before that Cinderella’s kitchen was overrun with ants of all things.’

The show goes with relatively few hitches and I manage to stay awake, not least because I am mesmerised by Petal’s costume which must have a thousand feathers which are shedding fast. By the evening performance she’s more likely to resemble a bald eagle than an African hornbill. A consolatory glance at Cressida finds her ashen faced. I hope she has plenty of glue.

The highlight of the show is undoubtedly Pumbaa and Timon singing Hakuna Matata with broad Cumbrian accents. Oh, and the mulled wine, a first instigated by Wendy on the refreshments committee, which makes it all just about worth going through again next year.

Chocolate cake and pink gin

2011-11-28T00:03:00.002Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

Rory is six.

It’s a sunny Saturday at the end of half term and his parents have brought him and his fourteen year old brother Sam to the castle to celebrate. Perhaps under sufferance as it is immediately apparent on arrival that this is not a family given to spontaneous celebration. They have asked us to bake a cake but that’s about it. Any further outward signs of enthusiasm seem quite beyond them.

Later on we sit all the children who are staying with us down to supper and they tuck into fillet steak and chips. Wendy is at pains to remind all the parents (there are several other families staying) that it is fillet steak - that’s f-i-l-l-e-t steak, but there’s no sign of appreciation.

‘Jeeze,’ she mutters, ‘I might as well have given them donkey.’

We have baked a big chocolate cake which Wendy thinks is best served as dessert for everyone to share. Rory’s mum decides she’d like to come into the kitchen to inspect the cake before it is presented.

To be fair she’d told us that Rory was sporty but hadn’t actually asked for a novelty cake but it’s clear that’s what she had expected, probably covered in astroturf with little marzipan men playing with their balls.

Reading the situation as only Wendy can, she says, ‘well it’s round like a football,’ and refrains from saying that while we do a good line in novelty castle hotels we’ve never set out our stall as novelty cake decorators, that particular hell being reserved for our own children and their increasingly sophisticated demands twice a year.

Meanwhile I have taken my own steps to warm up the party by pouring Wendy and I some very stiff pink gins.

It does the trick, for us at least. By cake time we are both in a decidedly ‘hang it all’ frame of mind which is just as well.

I put the six red and white candles on the cake together with a set of golf clubs made of sugar left over from a novelty wedding cake (nobody actually specified football) while Wendy nips to the office to remind herself of the birthday boy’s name (there have been far too many incidents of her befriending guests on first name terms only to discover on checking out that they are somebody completely different). Having downed the gin a little too swiftly she’s taking no chances.

On her return the two of us dim the lights and parade the cake in to the Music Room, heartily singing ‘Happy Birthday To You’.

At this point it is usual for everyone to join in.

Not a peep. Nobody is joining in, not even Rory’s parents. It’s as if they have never heard of such an outlandish custom and not until the last verse does anyone open their mouths. Even then it may just be to ask if there’s something wrong with the electrics.
As the candles are blown out we breath a sigh of relief but it is short lived because Rory is quietly but heavily sobbing at the end of the table, spluttering tears and snot all over his cake.

Wendy looks crestfallen as Rory’s mum explains that he is an avid Everton football supporter whose colours are blue and white but the candles are red and white, the colours of their arch rivals Liverpool.

She sits down heavily and I can see she needs a pick-me-up because she’s thinking that football is as alien to her as Paul Smith and Chanel are to this bunch of un-cultured heathens.

So I bring her another pink gin. ‘Here you go darling, another cranberry juice,’ I say with a wink, ‘it’s packed with antioxidants. It's just what you need to get through the rest of the evening.

'Excuse me,' enquires one of the parents, 'has anyone sorted out the electrics yet? We can hardly see what we're doing with the cake.'

Having seen the trail of mucus connecting Rory's upper lip with the butter icing I'm inclined to opt for a full -on power cut for everyone's sake.

Quiet contemplation

2011-11-13T21:44:00.001Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

The eagle eyed among you will have noticed that I have been a tad quiet since early September. Rest assured I have not been idle. With business at the castle racing away and me managing a little trip to the Munich Oktoberfest (more of that at a later date when I have managed to piece together from my friends' accounts what actually happened there) there has been little spare time for the frivolities of the quill.

I have, however, managed to make a very good start at redrafting my festering turd of a book (apologies to Richard Curtis - Love Actually).

Now, however, business at the castle has stalled, at least until Christmas, my book is lying forlorn and gathering dust by the side of the sofa with a post it note stuck on page 173, there is a mountain of redecorating to be done so there is once again time for procrastination, or some cyber musings.

Next blog - sometime before December begins - maybe the day after we meet our new bank manager who I sincerely hope is a lot more personable than our former accountant!

Attitude, more attitude and smelly socks

2011-09-09T20:36:00.003+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

We may live an extraordinary life in our castle but as far as the nuts and bolts of everyday family life go, it's pretty ordinary.

Living with a pre-teen daughter and a recently-turned thirteen year old son is a daily revelation. And that they are a boy and a girl delivers double the surprises every day.

Having lived in, and shared with guests, almost every part of the castle over the past fourteen years we now have the luxury of an entirely self contained wing behind the main castle building.

We gathered up all our favourite possessions from the castle to fill our new home as we looked forward to enjoying some privacy; not least so that guests and staff were no longer privvy to the demonic screeching that is the daily ritual of getting up on a school day and which doesn't end until bedtime.

And while it's not quite the same as sleeping in the main castle, we console ourselves that we are, atleast, sparing the guests the unpleasantness of actually witnessing any real family life in our family friendly castle. And although a recent Tripadvisor reviewer pointed out that 'we do resent it when we have to suffer poor behaviour from other people’s children. Some children appear not to understand "go to bed"', I'm happy to say they were not referring to our children who, in actual fact are invariably delightful in front of anyone who matters apart from their own parents.

But a year after we moved in our carefully crafted interior design is in tatters.

Our prize ornaments, so lovingly displayed in the hall and on the piano have given way to such delights as a thirteen year old's cricket box languishing in the cut glass fruit bowl, and one or two (never a pair) smelly anything-but-white running socks festering at the bottom of the log basket or dangling from the head of a porcelain dog.

It seems both children have grown up completely failing to understand the relationship between rubbish and a bin, presumably preferring to weather the onslaught of parental displeasure at the periodic discovery of snack packets stuffed down the back of the sofa cushions.

The newly laid carpet in Emily's room (oatmeal was never surely a good choice but Wendy says it was an end of roll and cheap) is patterned in multi colours with smears of make up and nail varnish.

'What have you been doing Emily, I'm sure school doesn't allow you to wear nail varnish,' comes the oft repeated wail.

'I'm not wearing any,' she proclaims defiantly, 'it's a Bratz makeover party,' and she holds up two grotesquely painted, tousled and generally defiled plastic dolls. She may not have painted her own nails but her hands and wrists are still sporting as much nail varnish as if she had but there's nothing to be done as the open bottle of nail varnish remover is on it's side in the corner of the room, leaching the last of the original oatmeal colour out of the carpet. 'It was Maisy,' she says, catching the look of parental despair. The one year old spaniel has an awful lot to answer for.

Less easy to blame on the dog, and not so easy to hide from us, are the regular iTunes receipts that frequently pop into our email inbox.

No matter how many times we change our password, the children figure it out. Hardly surprising really, as we only have a repertoire of about four between us as any more would simply be too much. And so they are able to make random purchases without our consent.

'But it's only fifty-nine pence,' Emily protests when I quiz her about her latest download of 'Talking Finn the Goldfish' for her iPod or her latest acquisition of 200 e-dollars for her own bespoke online runway fashion show.

'Yes, but look, a lot of fifty-nine pences adds up to several pounds.'

'Well it wasn't me,' doesn't wash and then there's a bust up as I tell her it's stealing and she says I just don't understand what it's like to be her. As one of us stomps off down the stairs, Wendy, smugly, will chip in with, 'Some battles just aren't worth fighting.'

'Oh shut up!'

On that note a new row begins after which Emily reappears in floods of tears to tell us she hates this family, wishes she'd never been born and why can't we just stop arguing, it's so unfair, if only she had different parents (oh, and a sister rather than such a hateful brother) her life might just be bearable.

It's clearly very difficult growing up: hormones, emotions and a jumble of immature brain connections but no matter how difficult trying to make sense of it all as a parent may seem, don't make the mistake of buying a book to help you.

We did.

The worthily titled "Teen Owner's Manual' promises 'operating instructions, troubleshooting tips and advice on adolescent maintenance'. It is full of pretty interesting stuff but buried deep within its pages is a paragraph guaranteed to make you feel even more inadequate that your kids already have, especially when it is they that point it out.

'Hey, read this Dad,' says Oliver, smirking.

If you don't want your son to swear like a sailor, don't use profanity.
If you don't want your daughter to let her frustration get the better of her, don't give in to frustration.
If you don't want your teen to abuse alcohol, then don't have an after work cocktail every day or get tipsy in front of them.

'Right, Thanks', I say, 'I'm fed up with the both of you, just get me a sodding drink and piss off to bed.'

And so the delicate balance between running a hospitable business and maintaining a functional family life has become ever more precarious. The son turned into a teenager this August (officially, since unofficially I think there has been a thirteen year old lurking inside his body since he was about eight like an alien life form waiting for it's moment to pounce on the unsuspecting care givers that gave it life in the first place). However, without resorting to the pages of the holier-than-thou tome cited above, I have begun to develop a set of rules which I think is working.

So, I'd like to share with you my insights into how to maintain a meaningful father-son relationship when one of you has all the communication skills of a caveman (and which one that is depends entirely on which side of the relationship you are on).

Never say 'I know exactly what you're going through because I've been there' because the automatic response to this is, 'nobody knows what I'm going through, nobody understands me, especially not you'.
Don't try to be cool by borrowing your son's new white belt with Superman buckle and showing it off in the pub. It's not cool, however well it demonstrates your recent weight loss and will just make you look like an arse.
Don't start deleting the hours of rugby/football/cricket that have been stored on the Sky+ box. Even if there is only 2% space left and the next episode of your can't-miss American trashy serial won't record, just don't.
Never enter into a debate about the merits and demerits of censorship and age ratings on DVDs and video games but do always remember that you're right and they're wrong on this one and stand your ground.
Do be prepared for the sudden outpourings of unaffected, genuinely warm affection directed straight at you when you least expect it.
But don't reciprocate unless you are the only two people on an uninhabited South Pacific island. And there are no ships on the horizon.
Never question the identity of the person on the other end of the monosyllabic mobile phone conversation and NEVER, EVER, shout out in the background 'Hello Chelsea / Paris / India / Britney, would you like to come over for tea?'
Always knock on a closed door.
Don't stop singing in the shower just because it's 'sooo embarrassing' and remind them you are not too old to audition for Britain's Got Talent (watch their face drain of colour the first time you say, 'If Susan Boyle can do it, why not me?')
And finally, for your own sanity and self respect, NEVER, EVER, EVER be drawn into a discussion of the comparative talents and shortcomings of your and anybody else's offspring (and this rule counts from birth). Murderous thoughts are guaranteed to follow.

When you know it's time to change your accountant

2011-07-21T17:32:00.000+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

Until a couple of years ago we hardly had any dealings with our accountant. We sent him our papers, he sent back our accounts and in between the PAYE and the VAT got paid. Then he got bought out by a bigger firm, other people took over our affairs and a series of blunders and cock ups meant that our new ‘accounts manager’ was almost a permanent feature on our doorstop and about as appealing as the overflowing ashtray after a wedding.

We have since parted company and we now have a new accountant. But our old accountant didn’t depart without leaving a very big impression on his last visit... although it wasn’t strictly his handiwork.

He has set up this meeting because, apparently, he is keen that we should be getting the very best from what his firm has to offer. In truth, I think he has been charged by his superiors to keep an eye on us because we have refused to pay our fees as a result of several missed deadlines and late tax returns.

His visit takes the guise of a ‘mid-term annual health check’. As we sit down to discuss our finances over tea and buns I start by telling him there is absolutely nothing unhealthy about our finances. The overdraft is buoyant and we had, to date, been doing our bit to help Alistair Darling spend his way out of recession and are now implementing our own austerity measures in sympathy with the new coalition administration... no more champagne on a Friday, wearing our underwear inside-out before washing, that sort of thing.

This is, predictably, greeted with a vacant expression. The man is, in fact rather vacant by nature and reminds me of Mr Bean. He calls himself our Relationship Manager but hasn’t done a thing to manage our relationship, other than to make it worse.

He makes me nervous, not because I am afraid of him, but because he is so inept I don’t know what is going to happen next.

And nerves lead to inappropriate behaviour.

At a garden party we held last August he was the only one who got his car stuck in the mud and as I pulled him out I joked that he should work harder, get a promotion and get himself a four wheel drive company car. When this did not go down well, I dug a deeper hole by suggesting that the rescue was surely worth a favourable renegotiation of our fees or even, perhaps, an accurate VAT return for a change. I’m not sure who was more relieved to be out of that field.

So, today I am on especially good behaviour.

‘Do have a bun’, I implore, they are freshly baked.

‘No, I am on a diet’, he replies.

‘Really, I thought you’d lost quite a bit of weight’, I say encouragingly.

‘No, it’s a gluten free diet, baked goods play havoc with my...’

‘Well, so down to business’, and I decide his bun in my mouth as well as my own is the safest alternative to putting my foot in.

It’s a turgid meeting as I knew it would be. He produces an agenda with headings such as ‘Business review’, ‘What your accountant can do for you’ (which is nothing more than a sales pitch for getting right what they’ve already got wrong) investments - nothing to invest, and pensions advice - plan to be looked after by the children beyond 50, and ‘How can we improve our service?’

Luckily at this point in the proceedings I’m still scoffing buns and am unable to express my true sentiments so the meeting closes minus my thoughts on how to better manage relations between his firm and its customers.

I let out a sigh of relief as he begins to pack away his papers but, horror of horrors, he begins a feeble attempt at small talk.

This is accompanied by a sudden smell of dog dirt. Surely it can’t be... No, no amount of drivel can smell that bad. But I am conscious that the smell, which is coming and going, is definitely real. I surreptitiously check the soles of my shoes.

After a further five minutes or so, more horror of horrors, I spy on the carpet beside the accountant’s foot a mouldering dog turd. This isn’t a normal addition to the fixtures and fittings, but a six month old excitable Cocker Spaniel has her lapses. It looks quite dry and has blended well with the pattern on the carpet but is perilously close to the man’s right foot.

I wonder whether moving on to the sofa next to him and shuffling him along might work but decide this could go horribly wrong and that his ideas of our accountant/customer relationship could be completely screwed.

He has obviously decided, judging by the way my gaze is darting between him and the floor, that I am losing interest and picks up his briefcase.

It’s upside down and all the contents fall out onto the floor.

In a mortifying slow motion split second he scoops all his papers up off the floor and stuffs them in to his case and when I look again there is no sign of the offending package.

And in a moment of pure comic irony, he turns to me and says, ‘well thank you, I think that has been very comprehensive, I’m quite sure we shan’t have any unpleasant surprises in the coming year as a result of today’s meeting.’

I’m speechless. As we walk towards the front door, Wendy approaches from the opposite direction to say goodbye and I’m mouthing behind the accountant’s back ‘dog s**t’ and pointing to the briefcase.

She fails to understand and assumes I am sharing with her my thoughts on the meeting.

‘May I just use the facilities?’ he enquires and puts down his case while he finds the lavatory. Quick as a flash, I’m delving inside, leafing through the papers in his case.

‘What the hell are you doing?’ asks Wendy.

‘Dog’s mess. Maisie’s poo. it’s in the bag.’

‘What? How did Maisie get in the bag to do that?’

‘Oh don’t be ridiculous, he picked it up by mistake.’

‘How can you pick up a dog turd by mistake, what on earth are you talking about?’

I can’t find it and too soon he’s back and away. As soon as the front door closes I sprint to the Music Room and by the time Wendy has caught up with me I’m on all fours with my head under the sofa.

‘Thank God!’ I exclaim, it’s here, the turd’s still here’.

‘No’, says Wendy, he’s just left, look, there goes his car, you’re not making any sense.’

Wendy demands to know what is going on. She’s agitated because this is far too much like Fawlty Towers for her taste.

‘I can’t explain now’, I say breathlessly, ‘but thank God for central heating because it dried out enough to roll out of the way,’ and as I kick the s**t out from under the sofa Wendy’s face drains of colour with the realisation of what might just have happened.

‘Time to change accountant,’ I say.

‘Before the s**t hits the fan,’ remarks Wendy and we both dissolve on the sofa.

Bureaucracy

2011-06-26T18:20:00.000+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

Bureaucracy.

It seems we can't live without it. After all, it provides employment for millions of civil servants. But surely even in the cosseted world of their ivory towers, when they're not fretting about their pensions, some of them must be able to see that the world might just turn a little quicker without quite so much form filling.

We have kept chickens for several years now without any interference from the authorities but when we decided to add some piglets to our menagerie suddenly animal husbandry took on a whole new dimension.

To get a pig licence we had to get an agricultural holding number from the Department of the Environment, Farming and Rural Affairs, affectionately known to all who have dealings with it as DEFRA.

This seemed innocent enough but, two months down the line, having installed the piggies and completed transfer notices for their movement in quadruplicate, we have been told that we have been selected to complete DEFRA's annual survey of agriculture and horticulture.

It's not quite as exciting as the old Reader's Digest 'you've been selected for our biggest ever prize draw' and I must admit that the request landed on deaf ears until today when I receive a gentle reminder with all the DEFRA subtlety of a stampeding bullock.

The survey, I am told, is compulsory under European Union legislation which, of course, means that every French, Italian and Spanish smallholder will have roundly ignored it like me, with only the Dutch and the Germans obediently complying. The Belgians will have been fully employed sending the thing out in the first place, with the Austrians doing whatever the Germans do (because for most Britons there is no difference between the two), and the Greeks refusing to play ball unless they can have a generous cash settlement in return. As for the Irish, Portuguese and all those Eastern European countries, they're all so on the geographical fringes of the club that the tentacles of EU bureaucracy must surely be less invasive.

Nevertheless, keen to be a fine upstanding citizen of Europe I open the email only to discover that I must log in to start the survey. But I don't have my 'Government Gateway ID or password'. When I telephone the DEFRA helpline I am told that agents are 'experiencing an unprecedented numbers of calls'. Clearly I'm not the only one who has lost their credentials.

I request a call back and, while I'm waiting, take a look at the useful hints on how to accurately complete the questions:

when calculating the 'Area used by you' (parking, barbecuing, sunbathing?) figure in the land area section remember to include seasonally rented in land and exclude any seasonally let out land;
your cropping / grassland / bare fallow (does this mean lawn mowing?) should only include land you have 'in hand' and not anything let out to others;
you can easily check your cropping / grassland running total (the number of lawns I mow in a day, the volume of grass clippings, the size of our compost heap, the number of lettuces in the veggie patch?) against the 'Area used by you' figure you have provided, by checking the land tracker at the top of any of the cropping / grassland sections;
remember to include yourself in the 'People working on the holding' (OK, will do!) section; and
sections which are no longer applicable are easily changed through the shaping questions link in the left hand menu and changing the initial question to 'No'.

What the hell is that all about? I am hopeful that applying the last piece of advice to every question might just be the easy opt out.

The phone rings. It's Mandy from DEFRA. 'Is that Mr Bennett?'

'Yes.'

'Can I have your holding number please?'

I oblige and Mandy confirms that I am, indeed, Mr Bennett. 'How can I help, Mr Bennett?'

I explain that I have no idea of my log in details in order to complete the questionnaire and then I ask if it is really necessary for me to complete the survey. 'I'm not really a farmer,' I begin to explain.

'In what way do you mean, not a farmer,' Mandy asks.

'Well, I have two pigs, four chickens and four ducks.'

There's an expectant pause as Mandy waits for me to add something like 'and two hundred and fifty head of cattle and a flock of one thousand sheep'.

All I can add to break the silence is, 'and one rabbit.'

It's clearly the cue Mandy has been waiting for. 'So would you say farming is your main livelihood Mr Bennett?'

'Mandy,' I'm caught between utter incredulity and unbridled fury at having my time wasted, 'if you can call two pigs, four hens, four ducks and a rabbit a livelihood, it's a sad reflection on the state of British farming.'

The irony is all lost on Mandy for whom I am undoubtedly just one enquiry closer to her retirement and that jealously guarded pension. After a bit of typing and, I'm fairly sure, a little tongue clicking too, I am furnished with my 'Government Gateway' password and ID. With the pigs in mind I muse that this all sounds a bit George Orwell's 1984. Does having a Government Gateway ID give me access to them, or them access to me?

Mandy offers to help me with any questions I may find difficult to answer but I assure her I should be fine. I have already double counted the stock, am fairly sure I have the correct headcount and, after all, how difficult is it going to be to use the 'shaping questions link' in the left hand column and change all my responses to 'No, no longer applicable'?

Sentimental pets

2011-05-17T23:44:00.002+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

I’m not sentimental about animals. We've just acquired two pigs and I'm leaving nobody in any doubt that they're destined for the table. That does not, however render me heartless. Harry the cat, who has starred in more than his fair share of these blogs, is dead and our lives are a little emptier for it. He has been run over by an unidentified (although there is a prime suspect) motorist on the castle drive. I am bracing myself at the prospect of breaking the news to Emily but it's difficult to know which way her reaction will go as I hark back to an earlier pet death.

I have little time for our daughter’s rabbit and guinea pig. Far too many rabbits digging up the garden already and frankly, what is a guinea pig anyway? Apparently they eat them in Peru but my daughter found that piece of knowledge too much to swallow if you’ll forgive the pun.

In terms of maintenance these two creatures demand more time than all our other productive livestock put together once you’ve factored in time spent catching them following an audacious escape attempt during hutch cleaning, hooking them out from under the bed and once, against my better judgement as I was all for letting the natural order take it’s course, wrestling the guinea pig from the jaws of a visiting Jack Russell.

But, they are part of our life as I am a sucker when it comes to indulging my daughter’s fancies.

And so it is that we find ourselves ready to go out to lunch and keen not to be late for one of Miss Worth’s pre-luncheon sherry receptions at The Old Rectory in the next village when there is a howl from the garden. Molly the guinea pig is dead. Still warm but definitely dead.

Happily my daughter is a very stoic eight year old and after she has recovered from her initial indignation that a guinea pig should have the audacity to die announces that there must be a funeral. Immediately.
It’s February and with the ground frozen solid I explain that we really don’t have time before lunch and that Miss Worth wouldn’t understand if we are late.

She seems to take this all surprisingly well and agrees that Molly will come to no harm lying in a shoe box until teatime.

Miss Worth is of the old school. She wears hats: a church hat, a hat for the shops and one for the WI. They are not interchangeable. She issues written invitations to luncheon and tea and expects the same courtesy in return. Any modern form of communication would be unacceptable. The telephone, she says is for emergencies only and not for idle correspondence. But while she may seem formidable, children always seem strangely drawn to her. We arrive a few minutes late but decide it easier to weather the look of disapproval that to explain the reason for our delay. I had suggested to Wendy we might text ahead with an outline of the incident. But we thought better of declaring in text shorthand, Guinea Pig croaked, keep sherry on ice. CU L8R.

Of course not a word is said on our arrival, sherry is served (warm) and we are soon being seated for lunch.

There are thirteen of us for lunch and, being a superstitious old sort, Miss W has laid a fourteenth place at which she has seated a rather moth eaten old teddy bear. My daughter makes a bee line for the teddy and sitting in the place next to it, starts to engage it in conversation. Suddenly, and from where I cannot say, she produces the corpse of Molly the guinea pig which she lays beside the teddy at the table.

Richard, a rather rotund country solicitor who is sitting next to me, and having arrived in good time to tank up on the sherry, simply exclaims, ‘By God there’s a stiff on the table.’

But Miss Worth ignores the whole episode and it is clear we are to carry on as normal. My daughter is also oblivious to the effect of her unannounced introduction to the table and continues a three way conversation with Teddy and Molly.

The rest of the afternoon passes in a haze and it is with relief that we return home to find the ground sufficiently thawed to dig a shallow grave. My daughter is happy to lay Molly to rest and produces the body wrapped in a handkerchief monogrammed with the initials HW.
‘Miss Worth gave this to me before we left,’ she says, ‘she said it would help Molly sleep better underground.’

There's been a complaint

2011-04-08T00:36:00.000+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

It is high summer and I am working out in the garden when Wendy comes out to tell me that one of our guests would like to see me. I am about to protest that this is not my day for dealing with guest relations but a single raised eyebrow dissuades me and I down tools to deal with the situation.

The lady in question is sitting in the hall and jumps up to shake my hand as soon as I come in. An interesting reaction from somebody with a complaint I think.

She begins by saying what a fantastic place the castle is and how we have got everything spot on so I prepare myself for a very big ‘but’. And when it comes it is far from what I expect.

‘But I am concerned for your safety,’ she tells me. ‘I have been watching you in the garden today and I think you are going to do yourself a serious injury.’

I have been hedge trimming with a power hedge cutter and mowing the lawns. ‘You haven’t been wearing any sort of protection at all and I can’t relax while I think you may end up hurting yourself.’

Momentarily I am lost for words. I want to tell her that I think sunglasses and a pair of flip flops are perfectly acceptable workwear when it’s this hot and that I have factor fifteen sun cream on my back and shoulders to ensure that I tan safely but feel that she may not appreciate my position.

‘I can assure you I am quite safe, perhaps you should just pretend I am not there.’

‘But I can’t help watching you,’ she pleads. This is understandable given the Adonis-like upper body I have had on display all morning and I have to sympathise with her dilemma.

The truth is I have never been keen on all the recommended protective gear that goes with garden power tools and this lady has not been the first to point out that something more that a pair of shorts, a pair of sunglasses and some factor fifteen may be more appropriate.

And it does give me some peace of mind that, before he even tugs on a starter cable, my Man Friday, Reg, pulls on steel capped boots, Kevlar trousers and gloves and a helmet with ear guards and would be safe for re-entry into the atmosphere clinging to the outside of the space shuttle.

But I have tried all that and once fully togged up nearly expired from heat exhaustion just pulling the starter cable on the strimmer. Not to mention that the safety goggles steamed up so that even if I had got going I would have been flailing around aimlessly with a spinning steel blade on the end of a long steel pole unable to see a thing.

Nevertheless, all that said, it is true that I have had a couple of near misses. Once when strimming the verges of the drive a piece of gravel flew up and hit my sunglasses, cracking the lens. Had I not been wearing the glasses I would have been blinded in one eye. The relief at not losing half my sight was only slightly marred by the demise of a jolly good pair of D&G shades.

Wendy once nearly took off the top of a finger with the hedge trimmer on a rare occasion when she felt she ought to lend a hand outside. To be fair she was inappropriately dressed, had her Paul Smith handbag slung over her shoulder and had only tottered out of the car in her Jimmy Choo lookalike slingbacks (maintaining a castle and all that goes with it doesn’t leave a lot left over for the real things) to show willing on her way to a shopping expedition (what's commonly known as 'popping to Morrison's for a few bits).

But if all this sounds a little too light hearted, be assured I take health and safety very seriously and just this week I was reminded of what horrors can happen if things should go wrong.

We have amassed a large quantity of tree cuttings and branches and the time has come to hire a chipper to get rid of them all.

If you've never used one of these things let me warn you that they are seriously scary machines: you put branches etc in the top and a rotating drum of sharp metal wheels, knives and flanges gobbles it all up and spits out digested bits of wood and pulp. It's the arboreal version of Sweeney Todd. The really scary thing is that you have to push the wood in so far and then the machine grabs it and it's literally ripped out of your hand.

I have got Reg in to help and, being pretty au fait with the whole process of wood chipping, is ready to go in his NASA safety gear. I am looking like a complete burke in a short sleeve shirt, a pair of chinos and deck shoes.

After a couple of incidents of nearly having my arm pulled in with the branches I plump for snipping everything into bite sized chunks for Reg to feed the beast with and from there it's an easy transition to another job on the other side of the garden.

An hour later I return with an armful of new wood and I'm now wearing a pair of work gloves and boots. But there's no sign of Reg. The machine is quiet. Menacingly quiet. And hanging from the hedgerow in front of the spout which disgorges the chewed and mangled shreds of wood are the chewed and mangled remains of a kevlar glove.

In that instant my mouth goes dry and a clammy sweat envelopes me. Then I hear a chuckle from behind.

'Ah see thee's got into a better bit of clothing fort' job.'

I swing round and, speechless, gesture toward the hedgerow mouthing nothing like a goldfish.

'Ah lost one o' y ma gloves int' machine.'

'How the hell..?' I shriek incredulously as I suddenly find my voice.

'It got caught on a thorn and disappeared onth' end of the branch.'

In my mind the hedgerow is covered in a gory mass of blood and tissue as I imagine what could have happened before I remind myself that since Reg is only about five and a half feet tall and the opening of the machine is at least six feet off the ground he couldn't have been pulled in. Could he?

'Shall we make a start on't next pile of cuttings?' Reg asks and then adds, looking me up and down, 'since you've got summert proper on yer feet.' He is completely nonplussed by the near loss of his right hand.

'No, we'll save them and have a bonfire in November,' I reply as I begin hitching the beast on to the back of the car for the journey back to the plant hire shop, 'it'll be a damn sight safer.'

Officially old

2011-03-04T00:33:00.000Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

It’s official. I am now old. So says Oliver at the tender age of twelve. And Emily his ten year old sister, concurs.

Not that they’ve actually said it outright in so many words, but I get the gist. And I know it’s true. When you sit in a pub garden and are more interested in the quality of the hanging baskets than how many more pints you can consume or your car envy has shifted from a Porsche or a Ferrari to a Landrover Defender you know that a milestone has been passed.

But the really pivotal moment when I knew I passed over the brow of the hill came when I bought myself a bottle of caffeine enriched shampoo for my thinning hair.

There’s no way of hiding such a thing in a family bathroom (it’s somewhat impractical to go rummaging around at the back of the airing cupboard every time you want to wash your hair) but I had hoped that the rest of the family would have the decency to ignore it. I should be so lucky.

‘Ooh look at those luscious locks,’ giggles Wendy the day after I start using the shampoo, ‘Mind you don’t get any on your eyebrows.’

I should have known I’d get no sympathy, especially after last Christmas.

We are gathering to open our Christmas stockings. A few parcels in I come across a CD shaped present. I’m really hoping it might be Susan Boyle’s second album or a replacement for my Best of Andrew Lloyd Webber.

But no. It’s Now That’s What I Call Music 40-something (which, if you don’t know, is the annual compilation of the best tracks from 2009).

The children have both been watching me for a reaction as I open it and say in unison ‘it’s to bring you up to date daddy.’

‘I see’ I reply shooting a glance at Wendy as I wonder whose idea this really was. She just smiles sheepishly, undoubtedly feeling a tad guilty as we are all having to listen to her Christmas compilation of Gregorian chants for the umpteenth time since the first of December and before lunch it was Perry Como’s Yuletide.

Emily seizes the opportunity to replace the musical monks with the new Now CD but only because she wants to play Leona Lewis on repeat. I’m quite happy about this as it is about the only song I recognise.

I don’t do myself any further favours by then telling the children that I can remember when the very first Now compilation came out. Groans all round, especially from Wendy who has heard that one every year since I’ve known her and Emily says ‘what, forty three years ago? Were there even CD players that long ago?’

‘Record players, we didn’t have CDs’, I begin to explain.

‘Oh yes, like that one on the stairs with the big horn and the winding handle, you mean?’ Oliver interjects.

Auntie, our only Christmas guest who I am sure has been here since at least mid November, causes a timely distraction by nodding off mid stocking and sending all her presents clattering to the floor.

‘Now that’s old,’ I mutter.

Several months later we have taken our MG (which happens to be the same age as me) out of mothballs for the spring and I am running Oliver into Kirkby Stephen for some sporting event or other. It’s a fine day, the roof is down and the engine is purring happily. I start singing Bat out of Hell by Meatloaf as it feels like the right thing to do. After a couple of minutes Oliver asks quizzically, ‘Daddy you haven’t been listening to your Now CD lately have you?’

‘No, darling, why?’

‘Well that’s rather an old song you’re singing,’ he says as he reaches over and pats my thinning scalp.

‘Oliver, we’re driving a classic car so I’m singing a classic song.’

‘Mmm, you’re just a classic sort of guy really,’ he replies, rummaging around in the glove box for something a little more up to date.

I reflect later that classic is a lot better than old as long as I can continue to inject a bit of cool as well.

So this year, for my birthday we’re going to a Take That concert.

‘Take That?’ Emily looks almost horrified when I announce triumphantly that we’ve got the tickets. ‘They’re nearly as old as you.’

Well, not quite. And they’ve still all got a full head of hair.

Stop laughing!

2011-02-15T00:54:00.005Z

For more musings from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

Stop laughing!

The world is not in the mood for it and legislation outlawing public displays of mirth is surely just around the corner. The newspapers give us no hope that there really is a future for Britain. Indeed the entire human race appears to be doomed to be consumed in a bonfire of its own avarice.

Closer to home, a minority of our guests are becoming ever more cynical and as we continually improve our product they find ever more spurious reasons to complain.

We seem to be living in a toxic world where people are increasingly becoming infected with a nastiness and pessimism that just didn't exist a decade ago.

But hang on a minute.

Can things really be this bad? Or, if they are, do I have to put up with it? The hell I do.

We already lead a pretty surreal lifestyle, cut off as we are from many of the horrors of everyday life such as commuting, inner city living and having to shop at Aldi, and have been selling shares of that for a living for nearly a decade and a half. We have created a bubble into which our guests step, leaving the world behind.

It's time to strengthen that bubble and keep out all the poison of the outside world.

First step on this crusade is a change of homepage on my computer's web browser. Out goes the increasingly badly written, ill-informed and atrociously edited online Daily Telegraph whose capacity for mirthlessness and gloom is only eclipsed by the doom-laden terminal pessimists that make up the community of commentators populating the comment section at the bottom of each story. Most of them are either Nazis or professional doomsayers and one can only be thankful, given their capacity to bring the reader to the brink of suicide each evening, that they aren't employed as NHS consultants. Their prognosis to their patients would be short and sour, 'Go home and die. We're all going to die.'

So, I have replaced the ghastly DT with The Daily Mash. Read it and you'll see why.

Secondly, I am going to petition ITV for a return of Spitting Image on a Sunday night. Whatever happened to that delicious half hour of rubberised satire that set us all up for the week ahead? It has been replaced by the infinitely polite Have I Got News For You which is clearly scripted by a bunch of Daily Telegraph reading litigation lawyers and, for the more cerebral of us, QI which likes to think it is terribly naughty in an ever so nice sort of way.

I'm sick of the way political correctness has invaded every corner of our lives. Nobody knows from whom it comes and hardly anyone I know subscribes to any of it. Be sure there is no house room given to PC claptrap at Augill Castle.

So, bring back Spitting Image as our diet of political uncorrectness on TV has been sadly limited to Top Gear, which gets into trouble for even mentioning Mexico but does it anyway, and The Weakest Link.

Next, shut down the interweb. It's the route of all unhapiness. We were all much more content living in blissful ignorance, occupying our lives with meaningful activities and pastimes, waiting for our daily diet of news over the cornflakes or delivered at six or ten o'clock by the seductive Selina Scott who made even the most ugly stories deliciously attractive (that's not to dismiss Fiona Bruce who can also put an alluring spin on World atrocities but she's even better on Antiques Roadshow: a rare oasis of optimism - at least on the part of the poor saps clutching Auntie Maud's battered old snuff box - on the BBC).

The World Wide Web is responsible for our collective ill-contented, cynical and overly critical psyche. OK, we can't shut the whole thing down but we can get rid of parts of it. Start with Tripadvisor. I don't want people to tell 40 million other people that they didn't like the colour of the curtains in their bedroom or that there were too many microgrammes of fat on their bacon, especially if they can't tell me to my face. Of course I don't mind the nice reviews but the whole thing just irritates me. Why do we have to bear our souls to the world about everything nowadays?

Then there are the insidious online communities. Take Mumsnet. A network of Mums who could floor you at thirty paces with a single glance which seems to have the collective power to influence Government policy and, by extension, probably, as happened in Egypt, to bring down the Government as well. These are the middle class mummies who would rather whinge about losing their child benefit than get out there and actually earn the same amount of cash doing some ironing or taking in a bit of washing. And as if that isn't enough there's now Dadsnet which presumably is a similar thing for dads who simply don't know what to do with their nine months of paternity leave other than to moan at each other about how hard it is to be a dad rather than just getting on with it. Both very dangerous.

Which brings me nicely on to whingers. Obviously, if you've got this far (God bless you and keep you in eternal glory) you'll realise I am having a whinge. However, there are whingers whose laments add nothing to the human condition (my whinges, if enacted would greatly improve modern life).

The whingers I have in my sight are the ones who can't see the simple pleasures in life; the 'I've paid for it so I'll have it' brigade; the 'you know what you ought to do' bores and the 'it's simply not good enough' or 'it's just not acceptable' crowd.

At Augill we are selling an experience, not just a bed. We are selling a slice of life as it should be without all the pressures of modern life. So, come and rejoice in the pleasure of sleeping in an antique four poster and forget that it's six inches smaller than the bed you have at home. And for those who find it 'unacceptable' that the WiFi doesn't work while they are on the lavatory or that they are unable to get a full mobile phone signal while waiting for their scrambled eggs and bacon, chill out.

We are going to shut out the worst of modern Britain and rejoice in the best of what makes us British. Enjoy good humour, mild eccentricity and a slightly bumpy drive. You can have WiFi in most parts of the castle (well, at least downstairs) but please don't complain to us if it's slow and don't take out on us your frustrations at having just read the online headlines that have now ruined your day.

You will get fabulously furnished bedrooms and the run of the castle. But it is an eclectic place and we run it in an idiosyncratic way so don't complain that you could have slept cheaper at a Travelodge or that modern hotels have better soundproofing. If you do, we'll just tell you, ever so politely, that you've missed the point and you need to learn to smile again. And hopefully, if we do our job properly, you may even remember how to laugh.

And finally, to everyone who has stopped finding the joy in everything around them, this from a book my daughter has been reading, Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson:

"For whether a place is a hell or a heaven rests in yourself, and those who go with courage and an open mind may find themselves in Paradise."

Ten years ago this month

2011-02-01T20:06:00.005Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

There’s a crystal blue cloudless sky, not uncommon in Cumbria at this time of year and then increasingly rare as summer sets in.

The fells, so clear and sharp, with every contour, each fold in the landscape highlighted by the sun, still slung low in the sky, look as if they have been painted in as a backdrop to this unrealistically perfect morning.

It’s February 2001. I am driving in to Kirkby Stephen, three miles away, drinking in the landscape and remembering why it was we fell for this place. The trees, still bare and with no intention of giving up their promise of new life for at least another two months, stand in stark contrast to the gradually greening fields filled with sheep, expectant with lambs. Everything is sparkling.

But something is wrong. I can’t say what. Do people look a little distracted perhaps? Is the traffic very slightly slower today? It’s that feeling you get when you’re on holiday, you haven’t read the newspapers, seen the television or heard the radio for a week and yet you know something historic has happened in the world you left behind. Maybe it’s a subconsciously overheard snippet of conversation, a glanced headline you didn’t even know you’d seen, but somehow, wherever there are other people living other lives, great news, good or bad, has a way of finding you.

I meet our friend Molly in the supermarket and she looks troubled. She has just returned from London and tells me she doesn’t think she’ll be going back for a while. The concern in her voice and her troubled expression don’t register and I cheerfully tell her I’m writing freelance again and at last some decent commissions are coming through.

‘Thank God for that Simon’, she says, ‘you’re going to need something to fall back on once this thing gets out.’

Molly is in marketing or PR or something like that and she is tremendously well connected with all sorts of useful people in the know. She is one of those people who seems to get the whole story about things while the rest of us are still grappling with the sketchy outline. But I am sure she is over-reacting. Only now she has mentioned it do I recall hearing on the news as I woke up this morning that some sheep, or maybe it was pigs, in Northumberland had been tested positive for a virus called foot & mouth. Apparently it’s not fatal and animals usually recover. ‘There is no risk to human health’ , the reporter said.

I look up foot & mouth on the internet when I get back to the castle. It looks like just a few mouth ulcers and a bad cold to me.

I tell Wendy what Molly has said and she is as baffled as I am. We enjoy a pot of tea in the February sunshine and our daily routine resumes. Emily is just being weaned and this is drawing most of our attention away from everything else around us.

But a week later, things are very different. While the sun is still shining, there’s a shadow moving across the rural landscape. The telephone has stopped ringing. Guests are beginning to cancel bookings. Children at Oliver’s nursery start disappearing, not allowed off their farms. The countryside is closing down.

Within weeks the sparkle of spring has gone, the skies have dimmed, the trees stand tall but everything else seems broken. Sheep are stranded in fields, unable to be moved and running out of fresh food to eat, cows are incarcerated in barns while their pasture lies empty outside. Farms become islands in a deserted sea, their animals and their people marooned waiting for rescue but from whom and from where they don’t understand.

‘THE COUNTRYSIDE CLOSED FOR BUSINESS’ and ‘NO GO BRITAIN’ scream the newspaper headlines.

Quite suddenly, and for the worst of all reasons, we are no longer outsiders, no longer the southern upstarts at the castle, we are united with our friends and neighbours in the hell that is unfolding around us as Cumbria’s image around the world shifts from lakes, mountains and Peter Rabbit to pyres of smouldering carcasses billowing plumes of acrid smoke into the still blue but lifeless sky.

Ironically it is one of the best Springs we have had since we moved here, day after day of cloudless sky, crisp mornings and warm afternoons but there is nobody here to enjoy it, no visitors to whom we can sell a slice of our dream because that dream has turned into a nightmare.

We have no stock to lose and although our fledgling business teeters on the brink, we manage to limp on as the crisis deepens. I continue to build up my feature writing which gets me out and away from Cumbria. But it’s not a guilt-free relief because every unnecessary car journey is frowned upon and we know that there are whole families, even small communities who are stranded. Every day we hear stories of farmers losing a lifetime’s work, or even several generations’ of breeding as Government vets condemn their stock to death. Not always because they have been infected, invariably they’re not. It’s cull first and test later. And then it’s too late.

Farmers, and even vets, who can not endure the waste and the madness become victims, taking their own lives having been party to the destruction of a lifetime’s work.

In everyone’s ears ring the radio reporter’s words, parroting the ministry’s reassurances, ‘there is no risk to human health’.

But there is no death here. The culling is all in the north of the county, some thirty or so miles away from us. Information is conflicting, tempers run high and accusations fly. Urban myth overtakes the truth and nobody believes anything they are told anymore. Tales of stock intentionally infected, haulage companies cashing in and contractors profiting from the government’s panic and ineptitude.

Farms become death camps as animals remain stranded and waste away and it is easy to see how farmers could wish for a quick fix, a chance to clean up and start again rather then watch helplessly as their animals suffer.

But in it’s own cack-handed way the Government is helping, even if it is just throwing cash, completely unchecked, at the problem.

There is no such help for the county’s biggest industry. Tourism, like the livestock is dying. The Government stresses that the countryside is open for business but all the footpaths remain closed.

We carry on with what business we have left and over the weeks up to Easter manage to salvage something from the real truth: Our countryside is not littered with burning bodies. The footpaths remain closed, but everything else is open.

Across the road, what started as bewilderment in our farming neighbours’ faces gradually turns to a steely determination. They keep their heads down and their farm gate securely closed. That determination is to keep the disease out at whatever cost. As spring turns to summer their resolve strengthens. The disease moves gradually further south but the frequency of confirmed cases is decreasing.

Tentatively, hope creeps in. Tourists begin to tire of being told where they can and cannot go and begin to return. It turns out that Americans have been peddled a confused message and many of them can’t distinguish between the facts of Foot & Mouth and BSE. They come confused, as is so often the case in normal times, to find the countryside is not as it has been portrayed on their television news programmes back home.

By early September it seems that things might eventually be under control and then we hear that the ministry vets have been seen at our neighbour’s farm. Having held out for six months their herd has been culled as a dangerous contact because there’s a farm nearby with a confirmed case. It’s September 9th. They won’t talk about it but I suspect there is a mixture of relief as well as despair in the final act, although the pill is that much more bitter as just a few days later the country’s final case is confirmed and then, as quietly as it started, it’s all over.

The Government file is closed and the Ministry of Agriculture cleanses itself of the whole messy business by reinventing itself as DEFRA.

But a new name and new stationery don’t heal the scars left behind which will take years to mend but not because of the thing itself. Foot & mouth was never the crisis but the way it was handled and reported was. By turning a blind eye or not acting in time the Government let it happen. There are many that were allowed to profit on the back of other people’s ruin and a good deal of nest feathering too, on the quiet. We hear of one farmer who bought a couple of houses in Glasgow with the compensation he received (presumably once he’d finished weeping for his lost stock). But it is the media that ran amok with the story and made it so much worse.

I am convinced it is no coincidence that foot & mouth should so swiftly disappear from the public consciousness at exactly the same time as another atrocity. Two days after our neighbours’ life’s work is destroyed the world is reeling from the news of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York. There is no arguing that the political and social landscape of the entire world changes instantly as a result but in Cumbria we are still numb from the effects of the previous six months and, in some perverse way, insulated from the full horror of 9/11. Someone else’s armageddon takes the focus off our own and we watch events unfold more with detached fascination than a sense of real shock.

Rubber, whips & turrets

2011-01-01T23:12:00.002Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

Is it my imagination or, since I have been writing this blog, has life at the castle become increasingly bizarre?

Regular readers will know that we're not phased by much and we're pretty open-minded but...

Cliff has sent an email which opens, 'I fully understand if you want to say no...' An inauspicious start I think.

'I am a semi professional photographer working in the alternative field.' Wendy, who has opened the email, is getting excitable.

'We've got someone looking for a photo shoot,' she exclaims.

'OK, can we get all the facts first,' I am still mindful of our encounter with the naturists.

The email continues, 'I am wondering if you would allow a room or 2 for hire for 2 hours at the start of next year? This would be an alternative shoot but would keep nudity to a minimum.'

And now the alarm bells are ringing. 'No way, no way.' I am adamant that the conversation is closed.

But Wendy reads on, 'I wouldn't need anything moving or a large light set up. I would be as quick as possible and I would promote you to other photographers looking for locations and also for people to come and stay!'

'Yes,' I continue, 'he's looking for an afternoon quickie with the video camera switched on. What sort of photographers would he recommend? Shoots for 'Totty in the Turrets', perhaps, or 'Breasts & Battlements'. No, no no,' and with that I leave the office, sure that I have my position quite clear.

Next morning I am in the office early and reviewing yesterday's sent emails. The first one I open is from Wendy and reads, 'Dear Cliff, thank you for your email, we would need to know more about the shoot before we make a decision - i.e. what kind of room you are looking for, what sort of catering arrangements, what publication the shoot is, would you need any special equipment?'

For heaven's sake! What is she thinking - that we can make some revenue out of the cellar?

Wendy is unabashed. 'He wants to come in January when we could do with the extra cash.'

I am utterly nonplussed. 'We are a family friendly place. Do you really think...?' Then the email pings and Cliff has replied.

'It's not for a publication, it would be for a private shoot. The theme would be fetish, probably latex and bondage outfits.' Just as I am about to gag on my own tongue I am heartened by his further explanation. 'I would keep nudity to a minimum but there would be a few topless shots I imagine.'

'Oh, well that's alright then,' I say sarcastically, still incredulous that anyone else thinks this might be a good idea, 'let's say yes as long as the manacles don't leave any marks on the wall and there is no unpleasant staining on the mattresses.'

But at least Cliff has done his research, 'I want it to be obviously posh, perhaps a lounge or bedroom? I know its a strange request and I totally understand if you're worried about association with the fetish crowd.'

Too bloody right we are... although I can understand the gothic appeal of the castle.

And then, as if we might be almost sold on the whole idea, Cliff tries to close the deal, 'I have a website if you would like to take a look, obviously some of the stuff is at the extreme end, but I'm thinking more like, say the Myleen or Casey....the more softer stuff.'

'Does he really expect us to look at his...' But before I can continue Wendy has logged on and there is Casey filling the screen cavorting on a bare mattress pushed into the corner of the room with who I can only assume must be Myleen.

'Oh, very posh.'

'OK, OK, I concede, it's not right for us but...' Wendy says as she leaves me to pen a suitably tactful reply about being family orientated and knowing our markets.

But just so that I'm absolutely sure of my facts, I quickly press the back button on the browser.

There's mention of bondage, a very menacing series of shots of someone looking less than happy in a bath and reference to Casey's expertise with clingfilm although, unfortunately, no pictorial evidence.

I don't think anyone will find the site in the favourites list if I call it 'Specialist Catering Supplies' and if they do, I'll blame it on Google: 'I was just looking for some clingfilm and rubber gloves. That's search engines for you!'

The shooting party

2010-11-29T18:07:00.013Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

There’s a shooting party going on just over the border in Yorkshire and we’ve picked up the overspill who presumably aren’t quite good enough to stay on the estate. The Price-Harringtons are a family with whom we don't really get on. We met them through our children's last school - an ill-advised foray into private education worthy of a blog of its own. Since getting to know them they have regarded us with a disdain more usually reserved for something unpleasant produced by one of the dogs. But we are too useful for them to deny our existence entirely. Apparently this weekend's guests came to the family's charity Ball we hosted a few years ago.

Now, there’s something about shooters and shooting parties that I just don’t get. Maybe you’ve got to be part of the set and, since my antics with a shotgun as a guest at a shoot a couple of years ago when I nearly shot the host's wife's head off, I am definitely not (I suspect word has got round).

For one thing, in these days of modern, high tech outdoor clothing, Goretex and the like, what on earth is anyone doing tramping across wet, windswept moors in heavy cotton drill plus fours tucked into woollen socks above a pair of polished brogues and wearing a tweed jacket and flat cap.

In the village is a tailor’s shop dedicated to kitting out shooters and gamekeepers in just this sort of attire.

Champions of the sport will argue that it’s all in the name of tradition but tradition can move with the times and adapting one’s attire doesn’t mean the demise of the shoot.

More people than ever climb Mount Everest every year but they sure as hell aren’t wearing the same garb and using the same equipment as Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tensing did in 1952.

But if the uniform of shooting seems a little at odds with modern life it is nothing compared to the eccentricity of some of the characters that sometimes go with it the sport.

As a sleek black Mercedes pulls up outside I’m quickly at the door as it’s pouring with rain. Out get two decidedly tweedy types and the car really doesn’t fit the image.

‘We’ve hired the car,’ I’m quickly told by way of an apology, ‘one simply doesn’t need one full time in Kensington.’

‘Right-ho! I’m Simon,’ and being September I proffer a well worn, season-weary hand and smile.

‘Quentin Farquhar-Smythe, delighted,’ and I get the impression he thinks it s me who should be delighted. ‘And this Chla...’

The lady is of some Germanic extraction and I just don’t catch her name. It sounds like Chlamydia but surely it isn’t.

‘Do come in out of the rain,’ I gesture them into the hall.

Chlamydia is wearing a fitted tweed jacket, white jeans, high heeled, highly polished shoes and is sporting a small Harrods carrier bag on her wrist by way of a handbag. She spies me eyeing up the bag.

‘It’s my Bag for Life,’ she snorts, ‘do you approve?’

Classy. Not.

‘Do call us Quen and Clam,’ I am invited.

Oh must I? And I resist making a counter offer for them to call me Si. ‘Let me show you round.’

‘We’ve been before, to the Price-Harrington's Ball,’ Quentin tells me. I expect you do jolly well from Martin and Clarissa’s overflow?’

A mental image forms of Martin & Clarissa’s overflow which I quickly put it out of my head. ‘Um, well I don’t think we’re top of their list of recommendations,’ I counter.

‘Oh yes, they say they’re terribly good friends of yours.’

‘Really?’

‘You’ve done it up in here,’ he says, unintentionally changing the subject, as we enter the Music Room.

‘Yes, and we’ve had some new sofas.’

‘Well done,’ he says, stroking the sofas appreciatively, ‘I seem to remember it was all looking a bit shabbers before.’

Quentin is carrying a shotgun over his shoulder and I offer to lock it away in the safe.

‘Going to shoot the guts out of a few dozen baarrds,’ he exclaims in a sort of gutteral rather overfed, over-stuffed with self-importance sort of way.

‘Excuse me?’ I didn’t quite catch that.

‘Baarrds - grouse.’

‘Oh, birds.’ I feel like shooting the b*****ks off a guest or two right now but I think better of telling him so.

With the gun safely stowed I take Q & C to their room, a garden suite.

‘Bit inconvenient having the door from outside opening into the bedroom,’ he observes.

‘Is it? Where would you have us put the door?’ I ask politely through gritted teeth.

He doesn’t answer but shouts at nobody in particular ‘Lights?’

‘Um yes, on the ceiling,’ I am perplexed by both the question and why he should be shouting.

‘How d’you switch em on?’

‘With the switches, usual sort of arrangement,’ but he’s not listening and is rattling a door in the bathroom.

‘Lavvy in here is it?’

‘No, that’s a store cupboard, the lavatory is behind you.’

‘Jolly good. Need a good turnout after all that driving.’

Oh for goodness sake. Even Chlamydia winces.

‘

See you for drinkies then, got the Price-Harringtons coming at about seven fifteen.’

‘OK, are they staying for dinner?’ I ask.

‘God no!’

‘Thanks.’

The Price-Harringtons arrive customarily late for drinks (they're late for everything - something to do with their contempt of anyone not sharing their genes) and give Wendy and I no more than a cursory acknowledgement more usually reserved for staff. They clearly think they are made of better stuff.

Well I don’t like to harp on about it, but, as I've said before, our house is still bigger than theirs and they know it. And it’s not falling down. And we don't have to open it up to the public (no, running a hotel is not the same thing at all!)

Dinner is almost ready and both of us, in chef jackets, go into the Library to see our guests.

Chlamydia is clapping with delight, ‘You’re not the chefs?’ she squeals.

‘Well unless we’re dressed like this to extract your teeth I think we probably are,’ I reply.

‘Oh you’re soo clevvaar. How priceless, what a wheeze.’ The whole experience is clearly way outside her comfort zone, having never encountered Heston Blumenthal or Gordon Ramsay anywhere near their own restaurants, let alone mingling with the guests, and she just becomes shriller and shriller.

Wendy turns to me, ‘I don’t know about wheezing, but I’m gasping for a drink,’ and we retreat to the relative sanity of the kitchen.

Dinner goes well. Quentin gets ridiculously drunk and regales the table about his happy days at prep school with one or other of the Price-Harrington brothers. ‘Got buggered senseless by the prefects, didn’t do me any harm.’ If there’s some debate about that, nobody’s about to start it here.

Chlamydia doesn’t say or eat much at all. Apparently she has issues with duck. It seems she’s happy for Quentin to blast them out of the sky (Clam doesn’t shoot of course, she’s happier sitting in someone else’s Range Rover leafing through the latest copy of Hello skilfully concealed inside the pages of Tatler or Country Life) but she can’t stomach it on the plate. ‘Don’t worry,’ she says, ‘I’ve eaten the salady bits and half a new potato, they were delish and I’m absolutely stuffed.’

Another guest who, while not involved in the shooting, has obviously loved being caught up in all the pretentiousness has eaten everything and has her own way of telling us how good it was. ‘You’re sooo brave doing duck, people who don’t know what they’re doing so often get it wrong,’ she simpers.

Between dessert and cheese Quen, Chlam and their new found buddies disappear, leaving the other half of the table looking a little shell shocked but ultimately much relieved. We decide to sit down with them for cheese.

Quentin spots this and come through from the Music Room.

‘Aren’t you going to come and sit with us?’ he asks indignantly.

‘No’ is our indefatigable reply.

King William & Queen Catherine

2010-11-17T15:16:00.002Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

Good news being is such short supply these days, there is much jubilation at the castle at the revelation that Wills and Kate have finally decided to get married.

We have, of course, sent them a brochure of the castle should they decide on a small intimate affair with just their closest family and friends in attendance. No room for minor Euro-royals, has-been celebs or power hungry politicians.

It's all very exciting. Of course, they won't come. We don't accept dogs.

But it puts me in mind of a time when the Prince of Wales came to stay. Or did he?

It's not long after the horrors of foot and mouth that ravaged the agricultural and social landscape of our county. Prince Charles has become a high profile friend of Cumbria and has been to stay with some hill farmers at their B&B with whom he would later become firm friends.

On the Saturday an article appears asking which other B&Bs the prince might also have stayed in and Augill is listed.

By Monday morning the village post office is alive with excitement and speculation. When did he come? Was he alone? Is he, in fact, still here? And someone is sure they saw a man matching the prince's description turning into the drive just that very morning.

'Is it true?' asks the postmistress when I go to collect our newspapers. Has the prince really been to stay at the castle?

I fix her with a gaze as serious as I can muster. 'Discretion is our middle name. I cannot possibly comment.'

And with that, rumour becomes fact.

Falling for a wedding cake

2010-11-12T19:21:00.002Z

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

We’re not ones for rules at the castle. It’s pretty laissez faire sort of place. But there is one rule, or maybe you’d call it a policy, that I have: I no longer touch wedding cakes.

There have been too many instances of being screamed at by demonic mother-in-laws, so protective of their creation that if anyone comes within twenty feet of the thing they risk being cursed to be consumed by the flames of hell.

And I have had one too many accidents with wedding cakes too.

The first time I had an altercation with a mother-zilla-of-the-bride was about three years ago.

It’s a sunny Saturday morning and the brides parents have driven up from the Midlands. In the back of their Vauxhall Corsa they have brought the cake.

Given the smallness of the car I suspect they may have set off the previous evening and have been driving at thirty miles an hour for the sake of the cake which has been much anticipated by the rest of the wedding party who arrived last night.

On arrival, I greet the bride’s parents at the door and hold it open while they bring in various boxes. One, two, three, four, five... how many tiers can a wedding cake have?

Eight boxes are eventually lined up on the dining room table.

‘So this is the famous cake,’ I say enthusiastically. ‘Can I see?’ I ask as I absent-mindedly go to remove one of the cake box lids.

The bride’s mother turns on me like a Pit Bull terrier and with a voice not unlike that unfortunate girl in the film The Exorcicst, she hisses, ‘Leave that alone, get your hands off it...’ and then, as if warming to my cinematic metaphors, ‘it’s my precious, only me can have the precious...’

My blood runs cold and I feel sick as I back away towards the kitchen.

‘Wendy, that woman is mad.’

Wendy explains that the cake with all its intricate decorations has taken six weeks to complete.

And on seeing the finished article I can see why. It is a fairy castle complete with towers, unicorns, goblins, flowers, enchanted trees and she’s even put herself into the tableau because I am sure I can see a Golom-like creature peering out from behind a toadstool.

Still feeling bruised from my earlier encounter I observe, perhaps slightly uncharitably that if the cake has taken that long to create it’s going to be pretty well stale by now.

And on a more serious note I have grave concerns for the safety of the Bride and Groom.

‘If that’s how she reacted to me just touching the box, what on earth,’ I ask Wendy, ‘is she going to do to them when they take a knife to the thing.’

‘We’ll probably have to throw a glass of water at her and then she’ll dissolve with a little hiss,’ she says.

Who says that making a wish when you cut a wedding cake is just an empty superstition?

More recently a mother of the groom was so protective of her cake that she slept with it the night before the wedding.

More often than not Brides are just relieved that the cake has got here in one piece and are happy to hand over all further responsibility thereafter. But not this one.

I suspect the Bride herself couldn’t have cared less what happened to the cake but then she didn’t make it.

When on Saturday morning, it is finally brought downstairs it is more of funeral procession than a wedding, with the cake, which is actually encased in a wooden box, brought to it’s final resting place.

‘Just leave it here, I’ll take care if it for you,’ chirps Wendy.

‘No! Don’t touch it please, it’s far too expensive.’

‘It’s just a sodding cake,’ Wendy mutters. ‘Do they think, after two-hundred-odd weddings we can’t be trusted with their cake?’

‘Obviously not,’ I say. Nor it transpires, can we be trusted with much else when we are presented with instructions on how to pour champagne and how much to put in each glass and then later Wendy is told that the best man has several years experience in cutting cakes so her assistance is not required.

‘Darling,’ she seethes, ‘I’ve been cutting cakes since you were in short pants.’

It’s all pretty extraordinary since there is absolutely nothing remarkable about the cake other than the flowers are exactly the same shade of purple as the mother of the groom’s dress and Wendy’s rage.

Later there is a row as the cake’s creator accuses the bride of not making enough of a fuss of the bloody thing and then she scoops it all up and takes it away.

But the real clincher comes one late summer weekend after which I am convinced that cakes and me shall never cross paths again.

it has become fashionable to have individual cakes on a tiered stand instead of a big cake. Usually these are professionally made confections which in themselves are as artistic as an entire cake.

On this occasion, however, Auntie Maud has taken it upon herself to make the cakes and presents me with three large plastic boxes full of fairly cakes.

To say they look like the sort of thing you’d expect on the Brownies’ cake stand at the church fete may seem unkind. But it’s true. They are no masterpiece.

Nevertheless, Auntie Maud, for whom, it must be said, this may be the final cake making swan song, insists that I should keep them in a cool place so I promise to put them in the cellar.

Foolishly, I decide to take all three boxes down the cellar steps at once balanced one on top of the other and half way down they slide out of my arms and land upside down on the stone flags having bounced down a flight of six stone steps.

It is one of those moments of pure horror that seem, cruelly, to last forever. When I eventually regain the use of my legs and I am crouched over the debris all I can hear is the plaintive sound of my own whimpering.

‘Please God, let this not be happening,’ and then, ever so quietly because I can hardly admit to what has just occurred in painful slow motion before my eyes, I mutter, ‘Wendy, Wendy, I have a bit of a situation down here, I need you.’

When she sees the devastation she silently goes about collecting the cakes, putting them back in the boxes and taking them upstairs to the kitchen. Silently. It’s not good. I just follow.

‘Lock the door,’ Wendy tells me with an impassive gesture towards the door between the kitchen and the dining room and then we set to work repairing the cakes.

To be honest, Auntie Maud’s efforts were never that good in the first place so a new batch of butter icing and a liberal dusting of icing sugar does wonders and there are only a few cakes that have picked up dust and mould from the cellar floor and they are easily washed down.

‘There,’ says Wendy triumphantly when we have finished the cake makeover, ‘nobody will ever know, especially if these six are put at the back.’ And then she turns to me. It has taken two hours out of one of Wendy’s finely tunes wedding preparation schedules and she is not happy. ‘You will never handle another wedding cake.’

‘That’s fine with me.’ So now when a cake comes in the front door, I am usually legging it out the back.

The inspector calls

2010-10-15T20:24:00.002+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

‘Aprons on, hands washed and hair tied back please.’ Our usual ‘Little Augill Cooks’ cookery teacher is unavailable so Wendy has stepped into the breach.

Eight eager youngsters are awaiting instruction on how to make pasta, various sauces to go with it, tiramisu and maybe a few sweet things to take home at the end of the day.

Wendy knows she’s in for a challenge. Six of the children are seven and one has smuggled in his little sister Amy who is only five.

‘I know you don’t really take under sevens but she’s no trouble,' pleaded her mum. We heard that one too many time about dogs before banning them from the castle. But Wendy could see the fatigue in her face and relented.

‘Now we have a busy day ahead so let’s get cracking.’ Ten minutes in, Wendy knows she’s going to need a stiff drink by four o’clock.

‘We’re going to start by making pasta. Who has made pasta before?’Eight hands shoot up. ‘Oh, OK’, Wendy is slightly taken aback, ‘well who can tell us how it’s made then?’

Joshua is quick to share his knowledge. ‘You boil some water and open the pack and pour it in. The others nod in sagely agreement.

“OK, well that’s sort of right but today we’re going to make it right from the start. Does anyone know where pasta comes from?’

A casual observer might predict the trap Wendy has just walked into. ‘Asda!’ exclaims Eloise excitedly.

‘No,’ frowns Freya, ‘Waitrose and mummy says it has to be fresh, not that dried muck.’ Joshua looks slightly crestfallen and declines to share the origins of his family’s pasta rations.

‘Italy’, Wendy interjects, ‘Italy is the country where pasta comes from.’

There’s a brief pause for thought, then, ‘well if we’re making pasta then it won’t be coming from Italy will it? It’ll be coming from England.’

Wendy fails to recognise the source of such intelligent logic and moves on. ‘OK, English pasta. Flour, eggs, olive oil...’ moments later there is flour, eggs, olive oil in various piles on the table, on the floor and on Amy’s head. ‘She’s annoying me,’ protests her brother, ‘I didn’t want her to come, mum made me bring her.’

‘Never mind, everyone continue mixing together your ingredients and I’ll help clean Amy up and perhaps we can find her mum.’

No chance, Amy’s mum legged it out of the door before the kids had even put on their aprons so Wendy promises she can be her special little helped for the rest of the day. Four o’clock can’t come soon enough but seems a hell of a long way off.

‘Joshua, we don’t do that in the kitchen do we? Go and wash your hands.’ Clearly Joshua had in mind his own recipe for pasta verde.

Then there’s a wail from Amy who has fallen off her footstool and is sitting under the table in a pool of egg.

‘Come on amy, let’s get you cleaned up. Again.’

The doorbell rings. ‘could it be Amy’s mum, returning wracked with guilt? But as I approach the door I know that it’s not just Wendy who will be reaching for that drink at four o’clock.

‘Hello Miss Hunt,’ I enthuse, ‘what brings you here?’ I hope she doesn’t see the panic etched on my face.

‘I’m here to do your unannounced environmental health visit and I noted that you’re also due for a health and safety inspection.’

‘Lovely, shall we go to the office?’

‘Shall we start in the kitchen?’ and she’s already puling on her white coat.

‘Children, Wendy, this is Miss Hunt, the environmental health inspector.’ The children seem non-plussed. Wendy, I’m sure is holding back a tear of despair.

‘Are you a doctor?’ asks Freya, checking out the white coat? ‘Have they food-poisoned somebody?’ Wendy whimpers.

‘No, I’m not a doc...’

‘Joshua, I’ve told you not to do that, we’ve got to eat this pasta for our lunch, now go and wash your hands. Welcome, Miss Hunt, to our Little Augill Cooks children’s cookery school.’

‘Thankyou, do carry on, I shall just observe if that’s OK.’

Twenty minutes later ribbons of tagliatelle are finally rolling out of the pasta machines, Joshua has had to wash his hands for a third time and is on a final warning to improve his personal habits and Amy has decided to stay under the table with a copy of The Rainbow Fish for company.

Miss Hunt seems happy with proceedings despite having been quizzed by Freya who tells her that her mummy says there are far too many busy-bodies and do-gooders trying to tell us all what to do. ‘Is that what you are?’

Later Miss Hunt takes it upon herself to inspect the kitchen and homes in on a two foot long wooden spoon.

The children are on to making the sauces to go with their pasta and one of them has cut their finger with a knife and got garlic in the wound. As I am calming the hysterical patient Miss Hunt brandishes the spoon at me.

‘This is not acceptable Mr Bennett, it’s cracked and the cracks can harbour germs.’

‘Oh don’t worry about that, Miss Hunt, it’s called Baboushka (Babs for short) and it’s only used for disciplining the children.’ In response to a raised eyebrow, I quickly add, ‘our children, only our children.’

I think Miss Hunt is computing the potential combined hazard of a bacteria infected spoon which has been in contact with naughty children’s backsides and in the event she simply says ‘perhaps it would be best kept away from the other utensils.’

A very reasoned response in the circumstances.

After a look at the other parts of the kitchen Miss Hunt declares herself happy and asks if we can just complete some paperwork and go through our health and safety risk assessments before she leaves. I can hardly bear the thought of health and safety on an empty stomach and suggest that since the children are just about to sit down and eat their pasta she must join us. cShe shoots a glance at Joshua and then at the hand washbasin. “Erm, I think I need to be at another appointment shortly so we probably need to wrap things up, perhaps we could save the health and safety until another time.’

I’m almost ready to embrace Joshua and his tasty nostrils and wonder how we can orchestrate his return next time the inspector calls.

A misunderstanding of the bare facts

2010-10-08T09:55:00.002+01:00

To read more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

We don’t ask too many questions of our guests. Sometimes we simply don’t ask enough and the consequences can be quite alarming.

Harriet and Gordon booked their house party about a year ago and have been very pleasant and easy to deal with. When asked what was the occasion they simply said it was a regular get together of like-minded friends. We thought no more of it.

We have been given carte blanche to devise the menus and choose the wines. ‘All they want is for everything to be natural.’ Wendy says.

‘It’s so good of you to welcome us into your home in such an open hearted way,’ enthuses Harriet.

‘Well, it’s what we do,’ Wendy smiles back, sweetly.

We have also been asked to find them an open-minded trio of musicians.

‘Open minded?’ Wendy asks, slightly quizzically.

‘You know. The sorts that don’t mind our unconventional ways,’ replies Gordon.

When Wendy recounts this conversation I roll my eyes and ask why on earth she didn’t press them for more details of what they meant.

‘Their taste in music is none of my business,’ she harrumphs but I’m left thinking that there’s more to their unconventional ways than we’re privy to.

‘You should have asked more questions,’ I am complaining as the day of their arrival draws closer. ‘They could be a cult or something. We may be brainwashed into joining a mass suicide.’

‘Oh don’t be so ridiculous Simon,’ admonishes Wendy.

We have laid on a lovely afternoon tea and at three o’clock Harriet and Gordon arrive. They are clearly very excited about the prospect of sharing the castle with just their friends.

‘It’s very special,’ says Harriet. ‘We do like a bit of privacy and it’s not often you come across somewhere so lovely and welcoming. We’ve ended up in some very basic places in the past.’

‘Nothing basic here,’ I reply.

By four-thirty everyone has arrived and are gathered in the Music Room hungrily devouring the tea.

‘What a lovely bunch,’ Wendy says and I have to agree. They are the sorts of people we thoroughly enjoy looking after.

By six-thirty everyone has disappeared upstairs to dress for dinner and we are making the final preparations for dinner. In line with the guests’ requests for ‘simple and natural’ Wendy has sourced everything on the menu from within a fifty mile radius of the castle, most of it organic.

The band arrives to set up and I am keen to find out what discussions they have had about music.

But the reply to my questions leaves me puzzled. ‘They don’t want anything out of the ordinary, just mellow and laid back. That’s what they said.’

Just then I hear movement in the upstairs corridor. it sounds as if everyone is coming down for pre-dinner drinks. At the same moment Oliver, our twelve year old appears beside me. 'Err, Dad, I think there's something you should know.'

'Ok, what have you done?' I ask with the weariness that injects all parent/pre-teen exchanges.

'It's not me, it's the guests,' he's being very matter-of-fact, 'they've got no clothes on and Emily is hiding behind the sofa in the hall. She's too frightened to come out.'

He takes me to the hall where we are confronted by a room full of breasts and backsides. The entire house-full is stark bollock naked and Emily is crouched at the far side wide-eyed, her face frozen with a mixture of horror and fascination.

I rescue Emily who, at the same time both wants to get out of there but can't take her eyes off the spectacle, and all three of us flee to the kitchen.

‘Wendy,’ I demand my wife’s attention, ‘what exactly did these people tell you when they booked this house party?’

‘Oh for God’s sake, Simon, can you drop it, they’re perfectly normal,’ comes her frustrated response.

‘What did they say?’ I persist.

‘They wanted somewhere quiet, private and natural,’ she replies with a slowness with which one might address a child’s persistent questioning.

‘Natural!' I shriek, 'natural! Naturist more like’. And rather more calmly, Emily adds, ‘they’re all coming downstairs starkers Mummy.’

Wendy drops her spoon. Two of the staff drop their composure while I try to regain mine.

The children decide they might like to retire to bed early. 'Or perhaps we'll go and watch a film,' reasons Emily.

'What about Free Willy?' Oliver suggests and they both disappear giggling.

‘Well,’ Wendy says slowly, ‘We must just act as if everything is normal. Go and serve them some drinks, they might appreciate not having to bend over to get their own mixers out of the bar chiller.’

Now I dislike serving at the bar at the best of times and as I make my way towards the library I’m wondering whether I should offer our guests cocktails. Straight up or on the rocks?

‘Oh stop being so puerile,’ I tell myself. I need not have worried about the bar. By the time I get there everyone is getting stuck in and seems quite self sufficient. In the Music Room two men are warming their backs in front of the open fire and I tell myself I am imagining a slight whiff of burning hair.

I am keen to get everyone to the table as bare torsos are going to be a hell of a lot easier to deal with than the full monty but not before I have thrown a few extra logs on the dining room fire.

Once seated a semblance of normality returns and we marvel at how relaxed everyone is and how quickly they make us feel at ease. And by main course it all seems perfectly ordinary (although we feel it best to banish Holly from under the table given her indiscriminate Labrador appetite and propensity for planting her head in people’s laps).

‘Do you think they were expecting us to take our clothes off?’ asks one of our waitresses.

‘I don’t think I’ve done a risk assessment for cooking in the buff,’ I reply. ‘And anyway, we’re cooking sausage and two bean casserole. We wouldn’t want a mix up.’

After dinner I confide in Gordon that we’d got it wrong and that we had no idea they were naturists until I saw them coming downstairs.

He stiffens momentarily but soon relaxes when he realises that we’re not bothered now we’ve got used to the whole thing.

The band have taken a little time to get used to the idea. They were outside when everyone appeared for drinks and so are only now being confronted by the reality of the situation.

‘Shall we start off with a bit of swing?’ asks the band leader and I simply cannot resist replying, ‘don’t ask me, the answer my friend is blowing in the wind.’ We fall about.

The rest of the evening goes much as any house party and it’s all very good natured. Having always been ready to strip off on the beach should the opportunity arise, I am almost tempted to join until Wendy reminds me that the staff may never be able to look me in the eye again. The guests enjoy plenty of banter with the staff and the band and by bedtime we are congratulating ourselves on dealing with such an unexpected situation so well.

Unfortunately we forget to warn the breakfast staff and next morning the phone rings.

One of the girls has come to work and is concerned that there are four people on the top lawn doing Tai Chi.

‘They haven’t got any clothes on,’ she exclaims, ‘do you know who they are?’

‘It’s alright, they’re guests,’ I reassure her.

‘Oh that’s alright then,’ she replies, clearly relieved, ‘I was just worried they were trespassing.’

Can I see your tweets?

2010-10-01T18:36:00.002+01:00

For more tales from a country castle, visit www.stayinacastle.com

If 2010 goes down as anything other than a year most of us would probably like to forget, it’ll be the year I became web savvy and 2011 should be the year it all comes together.

You see, tourism is now all about branding, image management and digital marketing. At a Yorkshire Tourism conference in April we were told that again and again and I felt terribly old fashioned holding on to the notion that included somewhere in that mix ought to be customer service.

Now you can follow us on Twitter, become a fan on Facebook, read our search engine optimised website and look forward, with rapt anticipation to our latest ‘digital e-zine’ and, of course, read my blog.

But that is all new and just nine months ago things were very different.

Back at the conference I am feeling befuddled when the presentation moves on to how to reach our desired audience. Out of nowhere comes talk of social networking, Facebook profiles and fan pages, getting bloggers onside, twitter feeds and tweets. I do, in all fairness, already know about Facebook, although I am ashamed to say that the first time I actually looked at it was when Wendy’s 63 year old aunt (who’d already unsuccessfully tried to introduce us to Skype and video telephoning) showed me her profile. But twitter feeds? It sounds like something you put out for the birds in winter.

Luckily help is at hand. Our host, who has one of those faces which is not quite familiar enough to be recognisable even though he clearly believes he is fabulously famous, explains that we (he must mean all of us collectively, although I note he is a good fifteen years my senior) are internet immigrants meaning we grew up in a world before instant broadband access, WiFi, Google, Digg, Flickr & YouTube whereas younger adults and our children – the markets of the future – are internet natives. It’s an idea that speaks for itself, but still doesn’t explain the nature of twitter feeding.

I decide to do some research of my own. I start by asking one of our girls at the castle, who is at university and should surely know all about modern forms of communication, ‘are you twittering and can I have a look at your tweets?’

Well, what would you do as a twenty year old girl if your boss, who is technically old enough to be your father catches you late at night and asks to see your tweets?

‘I beg your pardon’ she says, backing away slowly but purposefully.

‘Twittering, what’s it all about?’

‘Umm, is Wendy around?’

No luck there then. It turns out she too has never heard of Twitter and once the true nature of my enquiry is explained her complaint of inappropriate behaviour is withdrawn. So, I look it up on Google which is, of course what I would have done first had I been an internet native.

Two days later, I’m twittering like mad to anyone who’ll listen and picking up followers like they’re going out of fashion. It’s social networking and I’ve also got myself a Facebook account. I haven’t felt so with it since I got an ipod for Christmas two years ago, but that feeling soon faded after I had to ask another younger person to help me download tunes and since she went off to university I haven’t added another song. It’s not because I can’t, it’s because it doesn’t come naturally.

Now, emboldened by my new hip status, I ask one of our even younger employees if she’d like to be my friend on Facebook. But the look I get in return leaves me in no doubt that I have failed to grasp the intricate etiquette that goes with social networking.

‘No way’, she says, ‘my mates would crucify me.’ This seems a little harsh but I feel grateful at least that she has sweetened the pill as her usual response would have been something more like ‘oh my God that would make me want to vom’.

So I am now the proud owner of a Facebook account with one friend on it (and I am his only friend on his too – make up your own mind if that makes us both less or more sad or maybe just ultra cool).

Happily Twitter appeals to a more eclectic bunch of nerds and on my Twitter account I am following 129 other twits and being followed by 30. I guess twitter or tweet heaven is when you are being followed by more twits than you are following so there’s something to aim for.

That’s all last Spring and since then things have evolved. Everything stepped up a gear after I attend a digital marketing exhibition in London in September.

My beffuddlement at the Yorkshire conference is nothing compared with how I feel as I hear about natural search, organic optimisation and viral email campaigns. I check to make sure I haven’t stumbled into a health food conference by mistake. Natural, organic, viral? What about probiotic? Are these all types of yoghurt?

As the day goes on I hear talk of ensuring the quality of your creative, return of investment, routes to market and just as I think I know what’s going on things turn athletic with mention of bounce rates and landing platforms.

Just as I’m about to give up, having finished off a Gogi berry and pomegranate smoothie with kangaroo dropping booster for stamina at the juice bar (exhibition centres have come a long way too) I spy an arrow pointing upstairs to ‘The Google University’. In one hour confusion turns to enlightenment as two guys tell us about pay-per-clicks, Google Adwords and how the whole thing works and I realise that marketing is still marketing. it’s based on common sense and anticipating how your customers are going to find you and trying to reach them before the competition does.

New words, new methods but same old strategy.

And customer service? well, of course, once you’ve got the customer hooked, you’ve still got to meet their expectations and that’s still the hardest bit which no amount of digital trickery will change.

Oh, and in case it’s important to you, the only thing more organic than our search engine optimisation is the yoghurt we serve at breakfast.

The Ghost Hunters Part 2

2010-09-22T20:00:00.003+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

Ralph (I doubt this is his real name and guess he looks much more like a Bernard) is wearing a spotty red cravatte, has long grey hair tied back in a pony tail and a salt and pepper beard which I fancy might be as dishevelled as it is in order to conceal a secret beard-cam. He is about fifty, has the air of someone who has seen a lot of life and is now pretty weary of the whole thing, and is clearly in charge.

With him are Graham, a graduate in something way outside my sphere of understanding and the sort of person who wears hiking boots and a fishing jacket (which smells like it still has last week's catch in one of the pockets) whatever the occasion and Serena who, in green pockety combats, a baggy sweatshirt, hobnail boots and with no make up whatsoever to cover a rather unfortunate complexion, looks nothing like her name might suggest. (Wendy has told me that I must keep further thoughts about Serena to myself since just last week I almost enraged a castle full of half term mummies by exclaiming too loudly from the kitchen my delight at the quality delivery of breast we had received that afternoon. I was referring to the pigeon we were serving for dinner but apparently others thought differently).

Finally, there is Art who is the most presentable of the four but is let down by the most hideous set of teeth which make him look like he bottled it half way through the making of Extreme Makeover at the point where his old teeth had been chiselled out ready for the new ones to go in.

I do not warm to any of them. Surely any half decent ghost isn’t going to come out for this bunch of misfits. Wendy merely turns to me and says in a very mouthy half whisper, ‘what the hell have you got us into?’

It takes about an hour to haul all the equipment into the castle and while we are helping with this, Ralph is surveying the castle for possible spectral hotspots or some such thing. I mention light heartedly that we have various WiFi hotspots but he is less than amused, light hearted banter apparently compromising the gravitas of the occasion. Feeling suitably admonished, I decide to go and make supper which, in deference to the company should probably involve mung beans, tofu and gogi berry tart but is going to be far more elaborate since we do also have some regular guests staying (who are paying). They had been forewarned about the weekend's activities and are very excited about the prospect of contact with the other side.

Equipment assembled, it is decided that the vigil should begin at around 11.30. We are all told we should go about the business of the castle as if everything is normal. This is, of course, a ridiculous suggestion, not least because we are completely entangled in cables at every turn and are agog to know whether we have been sharing the castle with The Others.

The rest of our guests do take Ralph’s advice to behave normally and are getting happily plastered on their own spirit quest in the bar moving steadily along the line of malt whiskies on the top shelf.

Wendy has been agitated about the whole thing all evening and has taken something 'medicinal' to settle her stomach and gone to bed. I finish off the little that she has left in the bottle to calm my own nerves.

A couple of hours later, there has still been no spectral activity, our guests have either retired or passed out and another bottle of wine has done wonders for my nerves but not much for my head. I bid the ghost hunters good night, remind them where they can find the coffee and go to bed.

It must be about three or four in the morning when there is a sudden commotion and a piercing scream. Either Ralph has made an ill-advised early morning move on Serena or somebody has spotted a ghost. It’s a difficult call as to which is the more unlikely scenario.

Of course, everyone wants to know what is happening and soon the entire household are all assembled at the top of the stairs in various states of undress. is it a child searching for answers about the unexplained death of its mother, a servant doomed to eternal exploration of the back passage after being ill-treated by her master or a poltergeist angry at being disturbed?

No.

It seems Serena dozed off and was woken with a start by Harry the cat who jumped into her lap. Ralph got over excited, and in trying to switch on the spectral mass illuminator thingy pulled the whole thing over, smashing a couple halogen bulbs and frightening Harry who dug his claws into Serena’s breast.

Wendy shoots me a look that chills the blood and turns to go back to bed, muttering, ‘bloody idiots.’ I ask if she’d like anything to help her get back to sleep but she doesn’t look as if she’s going to have any trouble on that score.

At breakfast Ralph, whom I am now convinced is really Bernard, tells us that the vigil wound up after the Harry incident as any spirits would have been disturbed.

'Bullshit,' mutters one of the guests. I get a strong sense that everyone around the table is thinking it’s not the spirits who are disturbed.

I refrain from offering Ralph and the gang Scooby snacks for the journey and thank them for not finding any ghosts. I politely enquire after Serena’s left breast which I notice is sporting a Greenpeace badge but she is too busy packing up the Astra to acknowledge me.

The Ghost Hunters Part 1

2010-09-20T00:23:00.002+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

We've all scared ourselves half silly with the news that Hugo, our latest colonial itinerant has seen a ghost. Well it is Halloween, or Hugoween. It's all ridiculous but we're nevertheless aghast and willing it to be true in equal measure. When he tells me the full story of how he encountered the mystery woman in the dry stores after returning from a smoke outside I ask him what exactly he was smoking. He's a little too coy for my liking. Never mind Hugoween, maybe it's more akin to Hugogate.

To be truthful, I have never seen a ghost, but, not very long after we moved into Augill, we did have a once and once only (thank goodness) ghostly experience.

It’s not long after we bought the castle. We have got in to a routine of leaving our restaurant in London late on a Friday night and driving up to Cumbria in time to start on a weekend’s renovations on Saturday morning.

We crash in to bed at about 3am and, having piled every piece of clothing and bedding on top of ourselves to keep warm (we have no spare cash for frivolities such as heating) fall into a fitful slumber.

Our room is at the far end of the main first floor corridor and just as we're both dozing, having become accustomed to the feeling of having our lips frozen shut, the farthest door bangs. It’s loud enough to wake me but could easily be the wind or mum, who is living with us, having sold her own house to help us buy the castle and now doesn’t have a spare bean to her name either. Then the second door on the corridor bangs shut. It can’t be the wind as the two open in opposite directions. It is odd that mum should be coming in our direction and I wait to see if it is her. The third door and fourth doors bang, I call out to see who is there. It’s actually more of a sort of loud stage whisper as I want to know if there anyone there, but I’m so spooked I don’t really want an answer. There is no answer so I'm spooked anyway.

If it is someone, they are now right outside the bedroom door. I want to wake Wendy and tell her what’s happening but I’m too frightened to move.

After what seems minutes but is likely just seconds, a strong aroma of fresh cigarette smoke mingled with Yves St Laurent Rive Gauche perfume fills the room. I know who it is because Wendy has told me many times about her mum who smoked relentlessly and wore far too much Rive Gauche. She’s been gone now for some fourteen years. The smell lingers for a few minutes and then dies away.

I am frozen even stiffer than i already was with fear, and spend the rest of the night lying rigid and motionless. In the morning I turn to Wendy and begin to tell her about the experience but she’s beaten me to it as she was also awake, paralysed with fright and we had both experienced the same thing, not wanting to disturb each other, although what we really both wanted to do was jump into each other’s arms like Scooby Doo and Shaggy (make up your own mind who is who). Yikes!

We check with mum over breakfast that she was not wandering about in the middle of the night having a sneaky puff but she isn't listening and only wants to know who on earth was slamming doors at 4am!

Since then, we have not had another supernatural experience and are happy for that. So imagine our reaction when we are contacted by a group of ghost hunters who want to conduct a ‘Most Haunted’ style overnight vigil in the castle. I am clearly overcome by some dark force which has manipulated my mind because before I know what I’m saying, I have agreed. A date is set and the ghostbusters are on their way.

We are all at a loss as to what to expect as the day of the ghost hunt draws nearer. Most of the staff are adamant that they don’t want anything to do with it. Mum is convinced that we are going to summon up the devil himself. She is actually very agitated about the whole idea and I think she has visions of the castle being engulfed into a fiery hole, consumed by the very flames of hell itself and is relieved that she no longer lives with us. She is not, however, concerned enough to offer to take the children to safety for the night.

I’m trying to take a more pragmatic line, thinking up likely PR angles and possible photo opportunities.

It is a Friday afternoon in February when the ghost hunters arrive. I’m disappointed that they have arrived in a Ford Focus and a Vauxhall Astra estate. Where’s the Scooby Doo mystery machine? They could have at least come in a VW camper van for effect. As the two cars disgorge their passengers I can also see that useable photo opportunities are going to be pretty thin on the ground, at least until it gets dark...

...to be continued

A legless rodent isn't great for business

2010-09-16T11:43:00.002+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

The travails of pet ownership are always going to feature heavily in these pages. Usually, where death is involved. This is not wishful thinking on my part, although I will admit that there is a direct correlation between size of pet and dwindling of sentimentality. Regular readers will know of the tale of the lunchtime escapades of Emily's recently deceased guinea pig and perhaps surmise that that was the end of small furry creatures at Augill.

Unfortunately an eight year old daughter has a hypnotic effect on her father and all too soon after the demise of Molly we are putting our names down for two mice at the pet shop.

Now mice and hotels are rarely a happy combination. And the combination of mice, a hotel and a young cat is asking for trouble.

I try one final appeal to Emily's logical side in explaining that the natural order of things will not bode well for the longevity of the mice. I share my feelings that mice have been elevated beyond pet status and now many have an eminently more noble calling living in labs with human organs growing on their backs but I'm not getting through. So I share with her the story of the field mouse which Harry, our cat, brought into the entrance hall of the castle just as an American family was arriving.

'Oh how adorable your pet mouse is, it's so tame, it let me stroke it and it hardly moved' said one of the parents of the visiting family to Wendy. 'Gross' muttered one of the teenagers. Something quite remarkable but inaudible muttered Wendy who, predictably, had no idea there was a rodent lurking inside the front door. On examining the creature more closely she discovered that Harry had indeed brought in a live mouse that seemed quite tame. It was making no effort to seek sanctuary behind the skirting or under the furniture, just quivering quietly. And this was hardly surprising as, from the stairs came a howl of horror from another of the Americans at the discovery of the poor unfortunate mouse's two hind legs on the carpet. Gross indeed.

But Emily is unmoved and the mice come home. They have a smart new cage which she has bought with her own pocket money. They have food, a little plastic house with a chimney stack (although when I ask Em if they also have two armchairs and forks for toasting muffins on the fire she fixes me with one of those glares reserved by daughters for their fathers which says 'weird', 'old', 'fart' and 'locked up' all in one) and a wheel with an irreparable squeak as a constant reminder to them and us of the purgatory of life as a captive mouse.

They are to live in Emily's bedroom and seem quite settled and contented in their new abode. However, after a couple of nights, the mice's living arrangements are under review. 'They stink', Emily wails. She iis beside herself as they are staying up most of the night taking turns on the wheel of purgatory and Harry has worked himself in to such a frenzy over the fact that there are two ready meals fresh for the taking in the house that he has taken to spraying Emily's bedroom door with essence of pure excitement. 'That stinks too', she howls.

The mice are relocated to the utility room on the understanding that Emily can bring them into her bedroom for playing with.

A few days on, all seems to have calmed down, except Harry. It's Friday teatime and a wedding party are arriving. I check the children are settled and poke my head into Emily's room. As I open the door, Harry shoots out and there is a scene of carnage and devastation. The cage is on it's side, there is bedding and food everywhere and in the middle of the carpet one mouse is twitching, the other is trying to get somewhere, anywhere, yes, you've guessed it, on just one pair of legs.

I run to the castle front door where Wendy is greeting guests as I am half hiding behind a tree gesticulating wildly to her, imitating a mouse with fingers for whiskers, bearing my teeth and simultaneously drawing a slit across my throat. She fails to understand what I am trying to say but does understand that this sort of behaviour is not good for business and hurries everyone inside. Finally, after what looks like a rather apologetic explanation of her husband's erratic temperament to the guests, she comes out and I explain that she must distract Emily and stop her going into her bedroom while I clear up the scene.

What happens next then descends into true farce. When Emily eventually discovers what has happened she first says she hates the cat, then she hates us for having bought the cat, then she says she hated the mice anyway because what she really wanted was a pony and only agreed to the mice because there was no pony in the shop and then she declares there must be a funeral at once.

This is quickly arranged. A hole is dug, the mice are popped in and I'm just about to cover them over when Emily says 'there must be some singing Mummy'. Mummy looks at me, I just lean on my grave diggers shovel and she sighs the sigh of a mother who knows she must do whatever it takes for the good of the family. And so she obliges with what she later claims was the only thing she could think of and across the lawn drifts a moving rendition of Ave Maria. I lower my gaze into the grave to pay my last respects to two mice and a pair of legs and Emily sprinkles a few daisies in for good measure. When I look up the entire assembly of wedding guests is pressed against the Drawing Room window and in front of them all, sitting on the window seat, is Harry and I swear he's smiling.

Stuck on the roof

2010-09-10T19:04:00.002+01:00

For more tales from a country castle visit www.stayinacastle.com

It must be every householder’s worst nightmare, but in a 200 year old castle water dripping from the ceiling is more than just a bad dream.

It’s howling a gale outside, the rain is coming at us horizontally and the roof is clearly not keeping it out. I’m walking up the main staircase when I feel a sudden cold clammy something on my head. I look up and another spot of water falls directly into my eye. As I squint to see where it is coming from I can make out with horror a dribble of water trickling down one of the ribs in the vaulted ceiling.

The last time I checked there was no vaulted ceiling section in B&Q. No easy three step click together panels for repairing curved plaster cornicing and gilded bosses. So there is nothing for it but to drop everything and investigate before the whole thing ends up on the floor.

First stop is the loft. The main access hatch is some thirty feet away from the staircase ceiling and there is no direct access above it so it’s a case of shimmying along some beams and rafters and sticking my head sideways through a small access hole, together with one arm holding the torch to see what’s going on. I feel like I’m being born but in reverse.

What I can clearly see (and it is rarely the case that anything is this immediately apparent) is that water is being blown into the roof space under some dodgy lead flashings. This means I am going to have to get out on to the roof and do some emergency repairs.

Time is of the essence, it will be dark in an hour and a half, the wind is blowing ever harder and I don’t like heights unless I’m inside a pressurised cabin.

As I tog up, Wendy tells me to be careful. I say that I will bear that in mind and thank her for the advice.

The roof is only really accessible in two ways: Either a) by abseiling down on to it from the top of the tower or b) squeezing through a tiny window half way up the tower and landing in a a mucky puddle in a rain soaked gutter – this really is like being born all over again. It is, however, my preferred option of the two. Once on the roof I fancy I’m quite dextrous and am soon in the required location straddling a ridge and ready to slide down the tiles to the valley gutter twelve feet below.

I’ve come armed with some sheet lead in one pocket of my Drizabone which has done nothing towards keeping me dry as a bone since I snagged it on the TV aerial on another heroic rooftop escapade when I was almost left dangling over the battlements by my sleeve.

I did manage to rescue myself on that occasion but my tales of near death and heroic self-rescue were eclipsed by the family’s indignant howls that I’d completely messed up the television signal. I was hurt at the time that being left fatherless seemed less catastrophic than being left without TV.

Fortunately we’ve now got a satellite dish instead and I’m nowhere near it.

In my other pocket I’ve got some duck tape, some sticky gooey roofing tape and my super tool (a sort of Swiss army knife only better because it’s got a jolly good corkscrew on it). Wendy believes every man should take care of his super tool as she says you’ll never know when it will come in useful. Along with ‘do be careful on our storm lashed roof’ it’s invaluable advice I couldn’t do without.

I’m soon done and sure that the problem will be at least temporarily fixed – which in castle speak means it should hold for a good ten years. But a far bigger problem now presents itself. As I turn to retrace my steps I’m faced with twelve feet of very slippery black slate roof tiles at about 45 degrees, the wind blowing straight at me and no resources other than my super tool and half a roll of duck tape.

The only way down is going to be to scale the battlements and get a long ladder brought round to the front of the castle. I ring down – never, never go onto the roof without a mobile phone – but it’s engaged. I ring again and again. Still engaged. Surely, I kid myself, someone must be concerned for my safety up here.

It’s not long before I begin to wonder how long it will be before I am reported missing, will my swollen and bloated body be discovered next summer by a chance fly past of a passing microlight?

After what seems like hours but is, in fact, probably about sixty seconds, the phone rings. I think, ‘they’ve remembered me and while I’m up here they just need the television re-tuning’.
But no.

I answer, ‘Hello, thank God, I’m stuck.’
‘I’m trying to find reception.’
‘What?’
‘I’m looking for reception.’
‘Never mind the bloody TV, I can’t do anything about the reception, I’m nowhere near the satellite dish, who is this anyway?’
As I peer over the battlements at the front I see a very angry looking man with a red face jabbing his finger at the doorbell with a phone pressed to one ear and I realise that the castle phone must be diverted to me. I don’t much care for the look of him but it’s clearly unreasonable to blame him for my current predicament.
‘Oh yes, sorry, reception speaking, how may I help?’
‘I’m at the front door, it’s raining and there is no answer to the doorbell.’
‘I’m terribly sorry, I’m in a similar situation, perhaps slightly more precarious situation. It’s raining, I’m on the roof and nobody’s answering the phone, I don’t suppose you’d be able to nip around the back and fetch a ladder would you?’
‘What?!’ he bellows.
‘No, OK, bad suggestion, just bear with me a moment.’ He looks up and I duck out of sight behind a turret.

Just then I spot a cable to my left running vertically up the roof and over the roof ridge and decide this may be just the extra support I need to get over the top. It is just enough to allow me to plant my feet in the right spots but as I reach the top the cable comes loose and although I am saved from dying a cold and lonely death, I can’t help wondering if that might not have been a better end for as my eyes follow the cable in my hand I realise it leads back to the satellite dish, or did.

Faced with a choice of squeezing back through the tiny window or abseiling down the castle wall on the now disconnected satellite cable, I opt for the squeeze.

When I get downstairs (happily the leak has indeed stopped) I find Wendy placating the gentleman who says he has been insulted by a raving lunatic who claimed he was on the roof and wants to know what sort of place we think we are running. She is simultaneously trying to calm the children who are as equally irate about the snowy screen on the television and the horrific prospect of a Hannah Montana-less evening having to converse with each other.

I back out stealthily and wonder about ending it all honourably and quickly by throwing myself on the pointy end of my super tool.

The Russians are coming

2010-09-04T00:46:00.003+01:00

Read more tales from a country castle at www.stayinacastle.com
The Russians are coming. Well, in fact they’ve been and gone.
‘Vee are vanting your best rooms for tomorrow,’ it starts on a Tuesday afternoon.
‘Well, all our rooms are the same price and quality.’
‘Zay must be interconnecting and have a view of ze lake.’
‘We’re not near any lakes, we’ve got a wildlife pond though.’
‘You are not in ze lakes district? How fars is ze lakes away?’
‘Forty minutes.’
‘We can walk there in forty minutes?’
‘No, forty minutes by car.’ At this point, we’ll call her Anastasia, turns to her partner and says ‘zey are in ze middle of nowhere.’ I’m outraged as this is an observation often made of us that simply is not true. I want to remind her that while Siberia might be in the middle of nowhere we are in fact very well connected to everywhere.
‘Um excuse me, we’re not in the middle of nowhere, we’re just not in a town or village and people find that very charming.’
‘So you’re in ze middle of a field.’
‘We’re surrounded by lots of fields.’
‘Well zis is a very special birthday so ve vant ze best interconnecting rooms you have, and a table in ze restaurant for ze dinner.’
‘We don’t have a restaurant, everyone eats together. It’s very egalitarian (I’m hoping this may appeal to any communist leanings she may have but suspect she is more of the new monied type of Russian). Look, I hope you don’t mind, and I’m not in the habit of turning away business, but I don’t think this is going to be the right place for you.

‘You don’t vant us?’
‘I think it’s more a case of you’ll not want us,’ I reply. Anastasia can’t quite take in what I’m telling her as I explain that I’d rather help her find a hotel that better fits her expectations than for her to stay with us and be disappointed by her expectations not being met.
I suggest she tries Gilpin Lodge, The Samling and Holbeck Ghyll, some of the finest hotels right in the middle of the Lake District. She thanks me for my honesty and help and as she rings off I breathe a sigh of relief. But it is short lived.
At 11.30pm she calls back (I am always inclined to answer calls at this time of night because they are usually pressing emergencies from guests who somehow have actually got past my stringent vetting procedures such as ‘we forgot to tell you that we are allergic to feathers and will die in the night unless the bed is changed’ or ‘please can you remove the canopy from my four poster bed because I’m arachnophobic and am afraid a spider will fall on me in the night and I will die’). She tells me that she has looked at all the other places and ours is still the one they prefer.
‘So we are still cummink, how far outside London are you?’ In a last ditch attempt to put them off I am tempted to tell them we are twelve hours from London, a trip which will include two river crossings by manually propelled ferry and a traverse of the Pennines on foot or by pack horse if they can find a willing local guide. Then I think that if they have already escaped across the Ural mountains to get this far with all their cash in suitcases being pursued by angry soviet secret policemen even that is not going to put them off.
‘Six hours, maybe seven,’ well, I’m allowed a little manipulation of the facts at this time of night. She tells me they will be leaving London at nine so we should expect to see them around teatime.
‘Lovely.’
The next day they do arrive at around teatime and are delighted that the journey was less onerous than they had imagined and they have been able to take in Chester on the way - quite a feat given that they apparently left London via the M1.
They seem to be genuinely delighted to be here and there are many compliments about the magnificence of our charming ‘baronial styling guesthouses’.
I take them upstairs and explain that I have managed to give them rooms at the front of the castle which, while not affording them a view of the lakes, they do have a view of the gardens (including our wildlife pond) and the Yorkshire and Lakeland fells and that just behind those fells are some lakes.
However, this, rather inexplicably, does not go down quite as well as I anticipate. ‘And also the Scotch Highlands ve can see from here?’ asks Anastasia’s friend who I shall call Natalya and who is dressed in a complete designer running outfit that probably cost more than a small mountain in Scotland. I swear there are diamonds on her trainers that match the ones in her teeth (definitely not a communist).
‘No, you can’t see Scotland from here.’
‘I want to taste all that is best of Scotland’s food and drink tonight,’ she exclaims airily, waving her hand at what I take to be an imaginary flunky but which is actually aimed at me.
‘You do realise we’re not in Scotland don’t you?’ thinking as I say it that the only typical Scottish food I could rustle up would be leftover haggis from New Year followed by some deep fried Mars Bars and perhaps a dash to the local chippy may yield some chips with gravy.
‘This is not Scotland? Ve are not in Scotland? Ver is Scotland?’ Her pitch and tone rising hysterically with each question.
‘It’s about fifty miles up the road, you could get there and back by dinner time if you hurry,’ she’s clearly not amused and I decide to skirt around the geographical confusion by launching enthusiastically, as I back away towards the door, into what there is to do in this part of England.
A little later, Anastasia’s partner, let’s call him Igor, finds us in the kitchen. ‘I sink zer has been a terrible mistake. We are tellink all our friends already ve are celebrating tonight in Scotland and zis is not the case. I sink ve vill haf to leaf in ze morninks and not stay ze second night.’
We offer to help with recommendations in Edinburgh, suggesting that to be a part of Scotland not to be missed (the only part in Wendy’s book but let’s not stimulate a cross border feud here). ‘Sankyou but zat vill not be necessary, ve are vanting a country place with lots of character in ze countryside surrounded by hills and scenery.’
‘But...’
If I’d kept my mouth shut they’d never have known the difference between lakes and lochs, dales and glens. They’re only lucky they didn’t get all the way to Scotland and mistake it for England. Goodness only knows what would have happened to them then.

Nappies for breakfast, anyone?

2010-07-25T14:01:00.002+01:00

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Augill has become the famously family friendly castle and with good reason. We welcome families of all ages and sizes as extensions of our own. Perhaps this is because neither of us has a close-knit family; no parents of our own, no grand parents for the children, distant siblings.
Or perhaps it’s because by welcoming other families into the fray we can better disguise our own family chaos.
In any event, welcoming families as part of our own does mean that, just like the real thing, we do have to accept a few idiosyncrasies.

It’s half term and we are especially busy with families who have obviously decided that a stay in a castle is more prudent than skiing. Take note, please, the guest who complained publicly about our gin and tonics costing £3 (and, horror of horrors, they had to serve themselves). it’s a lot cheaper than a vin chaud in Val Thorens.
Half terms have become beasts that need feeding and a mini Augill industry has grown up around them: children’s welcome snacks on the bed - which have also been complained about because ‘Quavers just aren’t what little Francis is used to in the afternoons and wouldn’t an apple have been more appropriate?’ (Francis didn’t seem to agree and having stuffed the empty wrapper down the side of a sofa asked for more) - nappy disposal units, play boxes, baby listeners, travel cots, children’s high tea, DVDs and popcorn... even the children’s cookery school.
But it’s still never quite enough for some people. Lilly is twelve. She doesn’t want high tea with the other children because it’s pizza and mummy says pizza is evil and anyway, she doesn’t like cheese. Well, unless this is pizza mafioso and is packing a machine gun under the mozarella, it’s probably safe enough this once, but Lilly’s mum asks if she can join the table for dinner later.
‘Yes, of course, what would Lilly like instead of the goats cheese first course?’
Lilly decides on the crostini without the goats cheese... or the salad... or the roasted red onions... or the dressing. That’ll be toast then.
Main course is pushed around the plate and afterwards, mummy confides that lamb may not have been Lilly’s first choice as she is considering vegetarianism. Hmm, more toast perhaps?
As dessert is served Lilly is in tears. The pudding, apparently is too rich for her constitution. Mummy asks if there is any ice cream.
Moments later there is a wail from the dining room and Lily is seen fleeing to her room. The ice cream, it seems, was too cold.
‘Oh for God’s sake’, exclaims Daisy in the kitchen, ‘the clue’s in the name: ICE cream.’
Thankfully Lilly is the exception and kids at Augill are invariably our unpaid sales force, badgering their parents to return for another castle adventure.
Sometimes, however, it is tempting to encourage them back without their parents in tow.
Amelia and Adam have booked for a week and have been here for three days already. So loved up with Augill are they that they have forgotten that their children are actually still their responsibility. Not only have they become oblivious to the antics of their offspring but also to the effect they are having on everyone else. Luckily Wendy is never backwards in coming forwards when it comes to acting in loco parentis and has ensured that Marcus and William didn’t bleed to death at the cookery school, having already tried to see what effect a chilli up each other’s nostril would have, didn’t get mauled and disfigured while playing real life Bucking Bronco with Holly, our twelve year old labrador, and weren’t permanently brain damaged after discovering what would happen by bouncing on the trampoline with half the springs disengaged.
At breakfast on day four Marcus and William have wolfed down cereal and scrambled eggs and are off in search of further danger in the company of Oliver (he’s still our responsibility) who has promised to show them the most ‘mintage’ tree for climbing leaving Amelia and and Adam to enjoy a leisurely breakfast with Chloe, their nine month old.
Trouble is, Chloe had her breakfast some time earlier and as the dining room fills up there is a distinct atmosphere... a whiff of something not on the menu. Chloe has digested her breakfast and filled her nappy with what’s left.
‘There’s a changing mat and nappies in the downstairs loos,’ Adam is heard to say to Amelia.
‘Oh she’s alright, she doesn’t seem bothered,’ Amelia replies.
‘But the rest of us do’, the other guests and all the staff scream silently.
By the time they have finished their cereal the pong is becoming invasive. In the kitchen I hatch a plan to accidentally stab Chloe with a fork in passing making her scream which will prompt A & A to assume that Chloe has now not only filled her pants but also her boots but Wendy thinks that a little too extreme.
As I formulate another idea, fate plays a cunning hand. Marcus comes screaming into the hall with news that William is stuck in a tree, hanging upside down from one ankle.
Adam and Amelia are oblivoius for a moment and then, remembering that William is their son and therefore still their responsibility, dash to assist leaving Chloe parping and pooping contentedly by herself.
Quick as a flash, Wendy takes the initiative and with one hand delivers a full English to one guest while scooping Chloe up with the other.
By the time A & A return relieved to report that all’s well and that William is already eyeing up another tree, Chloe is back in her high chair, changed, happy and surrounded by lots of smiling faces.
That evening, Adam and Amelia reveal that as well as Chloe, seven year old Marcus and ten year old William, they have teenaged twin boys at home and that they can’t remember ever having felt so relaxed as they do at Augill.
This, of course, prompts an outpouring of sympathy from everyone until William puts a bag of un-popped microwave popcorn on the open fire to see what happens.
Next morning as we are still finding blackened nodules of corn embedded in the furniture up to six feet away from the fire A & A feel they must tell us that they hope to bring the whole family back very soon.
No wonder then, that in mid February, late May and late October, when we get enquiries from people without children we always ask, ‘you do realise it’s half term that week, don’t you?’
Not that that’s a guarantee against chaos because Adam and Amelia aren’t tied to school hols as they are home schooling their children. ‘It’s so liberating for them not to have to conform to the same boundaries as everyone else.’

If only I had spat instead of swallowed I'd have known how I got home

2010-07-25T13:51:00.002+01:00

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One of the lovely perks of running your own place is an invitation to a wine tasting event. The canny hotelier or restaurateur will have several wine merchants supplying his list, ensuring a constant stream of invitations to lunch in lovely places with copious quantities of free wine.
Unfortunately, we are not that canny and only have two wine merchants (well three if you include Simon who is a one man show, importing some delicious and unusual wines himself and selling them from the back of a van but I don’t think he has a budget for client entertaining), but they are both very generous with their invitations.
The latest is at a large country house hotel in North Yorkshire. We arrive with friends at around ten thirty for a day of wine tasting punctuated by a wine-matching lunch. It’s early but we have already prepared ourselves with bacon butties. The event is taking place across three or four rooms each filled with tables groaning with bottles of wine and champagne.
We make a bee-line for the nearest champagne. The bubbles invigorate us and there is no stopping us until lunch. Wendy berates me for helping myself to too big a glassful at one table where there is nobody to serve. I explain that it is necessary to have a little more in the glass in order to release the maximum aroma. She gestures towards the spittoon. I walk on.

Wendy is being abstemious having volunteered to drive so I return the gesture towards the spittoon. She reminds me that, as I should be aware by now, she is not in the habit of spitting and if she can’t swallow she’d rather not bother. She has, she says, come for the lunch.
There is, of course, always a downside to any pleasure, and here it is the inevitable wine bore who really doesn’t know when to stop and sounds as if he has swallowed a whole Roget’s Thesaurus and far too much of his own self importance.
Long before it is time for lunch, it has become necessary to sit down and so we take a seat in the library for a seminar on bio-dynamic wine making. Monty someone-or-other is something of a trailblazer in this field and his presentation is fascinating, made even more enjoyable by bottles of bio-dynamic wines which are being passed around the room to taste (closely followed by a makeshift spittoon made out of a plastic funnel set in the top of a tragically empty magnum Pol Roger bottle. By the third tasting bottle, the spittoon has bypassed our row.
And behind us is the wine bore. He’s hogging the spittoon having clocked that we have no need for it and is slurping mouthfuls of wine around his mouth much more noisily than anyone could consider decent. He opens up a discussion about the complexity of the wines and how they should fall apart on one’s palate rather than wait until they hit the gut. I’m starting to think that rather than falling apart in my gut the dozen or so wines already in there have started a fight. Then, predictably it’s all grassy nuances, hints of hedgerow, the essence of the terroir and overtones of the lunar eclipse. I’m starting to taste a more than subtle undertone of irritation. I’m keen to ask a question about the phases of the moon and how they affect the pruning of the vines but I can’t seem to formulate the sentence. We decide it is time for lunch.
It seems like a very long walk to the restaurant. When we arrive we are among the first there and hope that nobody thinks we have all only come for the free lunch. Wendy has, of course, but the rest of us are here for the wine. The waitress brings a jug of water and then two glasses of wine. It seems we are supposed to identify the two wines and then rate each against the food. This goes on for three courses. The food is delicious and so is the wine. Wendy is being very sensible and, as we are eighty miles from home and need to pick up the children from school on our way back, has not given in to temptation and suggested abandoning the car and getting a taxi. Nevertheless, her glasses of wine do not go to waste. We have tasting cards to fill out and by the end of the lunch I have drawn a whole family of flying pigs on mine which three of us agree makes a valuable contribution to the debate about which wine went best with each course.
On our way back to the tasting rooms the corridor seems to have got longer, but this may be because Wendy is steering me towards the far end of the largest room where coffee is being dispensed. Ten minutes and a long latte later I feel partly restored and notice that as we’re one of the first parties to finish lunch, everyone else is still eating, the room is almost empty and the wine tables are all unattended.
Wendy reminds me that we must be professional and that we are here to network and research new wines. This is so very unlike Wendy and I can only put it down to the fact that her thoughts are turning to her upcoming fortieth birthday.
I remind here that I have a clear strategy for the rest of the afternoon which is to find easily quaffable wines for summer in the garden and as I’ve already had to explain once today assessing a wine’s quaffability requires a good measure in the glass to appreciate the full complexity of aromas and flavour notes. She mutters something which sounds like ‘boxes of chocolate and fudge’ but I can’t be sure.
On a serious note, we do find some seriously drinkable whites and roses and then, oh manna from heaven, right in front of us is an unattended bottle of vintage champers retailing for £120. In a pincer movement worthy of the British army, three of us have poured three glasses before anyone notices. But it is a disappointing drink. The bubbles are just too big and as the room is now filling up again we notice that we are among only a few clients who have stayed all day and among all the fresh faced afternoon arrivals we are shown up for what we are. But, in this business you get out when you can and we’ve thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, met some new contacts and found some great new wines and I always maintain that a few aches at the end of the day denotes a good day’s work.
At school the children are curious to know why daddy is fast asleep in the back of the car and mummy simply says ‘daddy has been working very hard today and he has a bit of a headache’.

Basil, Saffron and the dirty ewe

2010-07-25T12:47:00.002+01:00

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A friend has called to warn us of some guests she is sending our way. It seems an odd thing to do and she is reticent to give me any details but I detect a hint of mischief in her tone.
My suspicions are confirmed later that evening when Saffron and Basil arrive at the castle.
They are typical London types. Saffron has that sort of north London respectability with a slight edge which suggests she was brought up in Hampstead but would rather tell you it was Camden or at the very least Belsize Park. Basil, on the other hand is one hundred percent Notting Hill (or North Kensington if you prefer).
They clearly work in media as neither of them can be parted from their iPhones and as soon as they have crossed the threshold are stressing about the best WiFi hotspot and whether they can get a 3G signal on their phones. When I tell them that we have WiFi coverage throughout the castle they survey me with utter incredulity.

‘It’s true’, I say reassuringly. But they don’t believe me and Saffron is already walking through the castle sweeping her device from left to right at arms length in front of her for the best signal. ‘I don’t think it makes any difference how far..’, I begin but think better of it. ‘Basil, let me show you around and then we’ll go upstairs to your room.’
‘Ooh Basil, trills Saffron, that’s the best offer you’ve had for weeks.’ It’s hard to say, given Basil’s Notting Hill skin tone, but I’m pretty sure he’s blushing. I, on the other hand, am just confused.
When we eventually reach the bedroom I am wondering whether we have made a terrible gaffe with the booking and that perhaps Basil and Saffron are not, shall we say, compatible bedfellows.
No need to worry however, since Saffron, who clearly has no secrets from anyone and doesn’t respect anyone else’s either, proceeds to tell me that Basil has just broken up with his partner Horatio, whom she apparently never much cared for to the extent that she even tried to sabotage a trip Basil had planned to introduce Horatio to his grandparents in St Kitts & Nevis, and she has taken it upon herself to ‘reorientate him’.
‘OK, so this is your room key, please keep it with you and ensure your bedroom door is locked at all times’, and I’m out of there.
By breakfast the next day we have named Saffron and Basil the Herbivores. They are clearly late sprouting herbivores at that and eventually surface at noon. We ask them if they would like a late breakfast and Saffron shoots us another one of her looks of incomprehension. It seems she has no idea what breakfast is or what it looks like and even if she did she’d have no time for it as she is already giving her right arm another workout waving her iphone high above her head searching for that elusive fourth pip of reception whilst simultaneously texting.
Basil, who I’m sure is now glowing rather than blushing, says they would like to walk to the nearest lake. It is now my turn for the incredulity. Firstly, I tell them that the nearest lake is half an hour away by car and secondly I point to the weather. But Saffron looks positively hurt.
‘I’ve bought all this outdoor gear specially’, she wails. Saffron is wearing a pair of pink camouflage silk cargo pants, a pair of knee high black leather boots and a bat wing cardigan over a flimsy shirt. Catching my reaction she continues, ‘I’ve brought a coat and a hat.’
I don’t venture to ask what camo-colour they are and opt instead to show them where we are on a map although this may be of limited usefulness since we are beyond even the northernmost end of the Metropolitan line.
While Basil and Saffron are out I ring our friend to thank her for the recommendation. She roars with laughter and asks if they have had dinner yet. I tell her that they haven’t but that they are booked in later and the peals of laughter die away as she has obviously fallen to the floor in a quivering wreck.
And so it is with some trepidation that we await the herbivores’ return.
I happen to be in the hall when Saffron tumbles through the front door. I enquire after their day and she excitedly tells me that they have been to the highest pub in England, The Tan Hill Inn which is about nine miles away.
But she’s not happy. She has got sheep poo on her combats which she is concerned isn’t going to come out. I suggest that in my experience all poo of whatever origin comes out after a good boil wash.
‘Boil!’ she shrieks. ‘One, these are DKNY, two they are organic silk and three washing anything above thirty degrees is going to destroy the planet.’
I then learn that this is not the worst of the afternoon’s events as she continues her tirade. ‘And when we got to the pub we couldn’t get anything, nothing at all.’
‘That’s odd’, I say, ‘they usually serve food all day and I’ve never been up there and not been able to get a pint.’
By this time Saffron is hysterical. ‘I’m not talking about the food or the drink, I mean we couldn’t get any signal and there’s was no WiFi,’ and she’s jabbing at her phone to make a point. When Basil walks in, in an altogether better frame of mind, I suggest he takes Saffron upstairs and draws her a long hot relaxing bath with, perhaps a bottle of champagne. I decide that things can only get better from here.
How wrong I am.
Unfortunately Basil doesn’t drink and by the time they reappear for dinner, Saffron has drained a whole bottle of champagne to herself, plus the decanter of sherry in the bedroom, and all this on top of two pints of Dirty Ewe Ale she had at lunch, presumably to try to get over the dirty ewe whose poo is now on her trousers.
By the time the three of them (that’s Basil, Saffron and the iphone) join the table for dinner she is incoherent and quite unable to coordinate eating and texting simultaneously). basil asks if it may be possible for saffron to retire to her room with a starter. That’s no problem and I suggest that we can take the rest of her meal up to her. ‘No need, she may just manage the starter and then she’ll be out cold.’
Unencumbered, Basil is a delight and thoroughly enjoys his evening. We don’t see Saffron again and after breakfast as basil is paying his bill he tells me that he fully intends to give things another go with Horatio.

Adrift in a rudderless ship

2010-07-25T12:33:00.002+01:00

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Whenever Wendy goes away we joke that the castle is a rudderless ship without her. On a recent trip away myself, the sailing metaphors took on a whole new significance.
There are two categories of once in a lifetime experiences. There are those that you are never going to get another chance to repeat and then there are those you’d never want to repeat.
I have been invited to join some army friends on an ‘adventure training’ sailing voyage across the English Channel. I am not a good sailor but accept in the knowledge that this is definitely going to fall into the former category of once in a lifetime experiences and in the hope that it does not qualify for the latter.
As the adventure draws closer I am getting more nervous about my ability to cope with whatever the channel is going to throw at us. On hearing the news, a friend who has known me longer than anyone exclaims, ‘What are you thinking of, you get sea sick on skateboard.’ She’s not far off the mark but Oliver reminds me with typical ten-year-old wisdom that ‘you might not get another chance like it Daddy, you’re not getting any younger.’ Thanks son.

Our yatcht is moored at Portland marina on the south coast. It’s a six or seven hour drive and I leave none of my shipmates in any doubt about what they have taken on in inviting me along by insisting, like an aged aunt who will not be moved once she is settled, that I must sit in the front of the car for the whole journey because of my propensity for travel sickness.
When we arrive at Portland we are greeted by the Regimental Sergeant Major whose opening gambit is ‘It’s a f*****g small boat sir.’ He introduces himself as the RSM but says I can call him Dean as I am a civilian. It never does sound quite right and because it just suits him better, he remains RSM for the duration of the voyage.
As we set foot on the marina pontoon I am already feeling queasy and this isn’t helped as we get a first look at the yatcht. The RSM’s initial assessment may have been a little generous. Seven men will spend five nights in a boat no bigger than the one in which the Owl and the Pussycat set sail.
Of course, this being the army I’m not about to say anything and it transpires I don’t have to because the rest of the crew are soon whining like a bunch of pansies about where to put their kit, who’s going to sleep where and the dubious stains on one of the pull out hammocks. One wonders whether the defence of the realm is in safe hands. I gain the moral upper hand by keeping quiet while they are all dealing with varying degrees of confusion with their admin (that’s unpacking for non military personnel) whilst quietly sitting down on the best berth, spreading my stuff out and so bagging it for myself.
After a lively debate over whether we should go out into town for fish and chips or eat some of the on-board rations that the Training Major (herein known as the TM) has brought, I am over-ruled and we have to endure mountains of rice topped with tinned chicken in white sauce. It’s filling but tasty would be stretching the truth. We all politely decline seconds.
We spend our first night in the marina waiting for the tide which takes us out into open water at 8am the next morning and then the fun begins.
The TM has nominated himself as ship’s cook and insists, against everyone’s better judgement that we should fill up with fried egg and fried spam sandwiches before setting sail. It’s a decision that will come back, literally to haunt us time and again before the day is over.
Roughly two hours into our twelve hour crossing of one of the most congested and unpredictable tracts of sea in the world (these are facts that were not contained in the pre-board briefing) Captain Preston (Regimental Organisation Support Officer, herein known as ROSO) has offered up our first gift to the sea. Whether or not the fish appreciate the friend egg and spam, it’s clear that ROSO did not enjoy tasting it all again. He remains motionless for several hours whilst I and our valiant second lieutenant Charlie join the chunder club with further offerings to Neptune.
For a while I feel much better and fit enough to take the wheel. This, of course, helps enormously as there is no time to dwell on how I am feeling. Unfortunately I have overdosed on my sea sickness pills and when I suddenly exclaim that I have sighted land I am told it is just another ship. I am not to be dissuaded though and steer a course for salvation. I remain convinced that we are heading for land even though it is moving away from us and there is a plume of smoke coming out of the funnel shaped top. Later I read that one of the side effects of too many pills is hallucinations.
By now the weather is closing in and our skipper, who I think has developed a particularly dry manner from too many years on the water, tells us that the wind and tide are fighting each other, resulting in an ever larger swell, there is no way we can get to France and the tide may even push us past our safe haven at the channel island of Alderney. I dare to ask where we’d end up if we missed Alderney and don’t much care for ‘the Atlantic’ as an answer. It’s news that neither I or Charlie can stomach and we’re over the side again. By the time I have recovered sufficiently to focus again there is rain lashing our faces, we’re bobbing around like a cork, the yatcht is practically on its side and I would be near to tears but for the fact that the repeated vomiting has left me practically dessicated.
Unfortunately, during my stint at the wheel we have steered of course in my quest for the mythical island and failed to take heed of a fast approaching super tanker. By the time the skipper comes on deck (apparently he was checking the tide times but I suspect he was actually swigging rum) the tanker has had to take evasive action by way of a 360 degree turn around us.
This is not good seamanship on our part and puts us in potential peril.
Once danger has been averted and land is eventually sighted by someone less medicated than me I can barely raise a smile. ROSO is still motionless. I’ve known ROSO for some years and this is the longest I have ever known him be silent so I know things must be serious. They are made no more bearable by the TM’s ridiculous efforts to cheer us all up by taking on the mantle of Captain bloody Beaky and offering everyone a cheese and ketchup sandwich whilst singing sea shanties.
Through all of this the RSM has been making no effort whatsoever to familiarise himself with the routines of sailing and has been asleep below deck. I decide that this is the best place to be as we are now being drenched by bucket loads of water at the bottom of every wave. My stomach is completely empty, possibly even inside out by now, so I retreat to the lower quarters.
Once laid down I dare not move and am determined to hold on to whatever I can no matter what. My resolve is soon put to the test. An hour off Alderney we hit what can only be described as a maelstrom. Two tides and what feels like seven winds are conspiring to create the perfect storm through which we have to pass to get in to harbour. The contents of the galley are flying through the cabin, everything is falling out of lockers (this is called bad admin) but I am holding on. All of a sudden the RSM, a big man by his own admission, comes flying horizontally through the air from the front to the back of the cabin accompanied by tea bags, the remnants of the rice from last night. He is closely followed by ROSO who apparently now thinks the whole thing is worthy of a video. Sadly he can’t operate the camera because he can’t see anything through his salt encrusted glasses. His request for help with the camera proves too much for the RSM who simply says ‘excuse me sir’ as he lunges for the toilet. He is a jolly polite sort of chap. Unfortunately he becomes entangled in a bungee cord on a rucksack and can’t quite reach the toilet bowl. The other end of the bungee is caught around ROSO’s ankles. They are both desperately trying to pull in opposite directions. I can do nothing to help as both my hands are grasping something solid and immovable. ROSO is once again rendered motionless and the glance he throws me is one of sheer panic. He would later tell me that the look I returned him was one of sheer terror and I wouldn’t disagree.
By the time we reach the relative calm of Alderney harbour (which isn’t all that calm) I have packed my bag (or completed my admin) and am making plans to return home by plane, train, mule or foot. The RSM has vowed to join me. I ring home as soon as I am ashore and recount the experience. Wendy reassures me that I’ll have found my sea legs now. I remind her that I’m still missing my stomach and when Emily warns me not to get eaten by a shark I tell her that that would have been a blessed relief. So how it is I set foot back on that yatcht the next day I will never be able to fully explain. Call it peer pressure.
And the tale of how we got back to England three days later is one for another time.

After mistaking the Proseccho for the Pelligrino Easter leaves me feeling a little billious

2010-04-14T01:28:00.002+01:00

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I had tried to abstain from Easter this year. Last year was a very exhausting experience.

It’s Easter 2009 and having catered for a wedding on Maundy Thursday we are looking forward to a weekend full of guests and, blissfully, (and contrary to what the forecasters said and what is happening in southern England) as Good Friday dawns, the sun rises into a crystal blue sky.

In customary Easter fashion, the phone starts ringing about 8.30 with people wanting to enquire about availability for...

Easter.

‘Do you mean next Easter?’

‘No, this weekend.’

‘I’m afraid we’re full.’

‘What, completely full? Not even room for a family of fourteen?’

It’s hardly worth going on with any explanation. ‘No, but I can take your details for New Year.’

Friday and Saturday pass uneventfully such as any busy high season weekend, but on Sunday morning dawns the realisation that there is the equivalent of another full weekend still to go. Nevertheless, the sun is still shining and we make time for a family breakfast and an exchange of Easter goodies.

Having lobbied to be included on the family Easter Egg list for some seven years, Wendy has bought me the largest egg imaginable. It’s rude not to show appreciation and by mid afternoon on Easter Sunday I’ve eaten over half of it. It leaves me feeling decidedly bilious and, as regular readers will know, the usual remedy for such attacks is a generous glass of wine. Unfortunately, prior to scoffing the egg, I have already consumed double the recommended dose of medicinal wine which has a) added to my current state of nausea and b) rendered further doses counter productive.

It’s the icing on the cake, or to be a little more seasonal, the yolk in the omelette of a weekend that already seems to have gone on for a month. Hardly surprising given what I had to endure earlier in the day.

Oliver is now of an age where he is finding increasingly ingenious ways of extracting money out of us and any other gullible individuals. Having already caught him trying to sell items of his wardrobe to his sister, including old pyjama bottoms and smelly worn out trainers, we have told him to find more honest outlets for his entrepreneurial flair.

Hence, on Easter Sunday morning, we are sitting in the Co-op car park setting up our first car boot sale. I have bank rolled the venture by paying for the pitch, so it will take £6 of sales to break even. The sun is shining and has brought out a decent crowd, so there is every prospect of a profit. Or at least there would be were it not for the somewhat dubious selection of goods the children have decided to sell. Added to this, the fact that they have been left to formulate their own pricing and their expectations are, to say the least, unrealistic.

At the front of the stall is one of Emily’s dolls. It’s called something menacing like ‘Baby Annie, I can swim, wet myself, vomit and answer back with built in voice recognition unit’. Emily thinks this is worth £10 but it has had one side of her head shaved, the other side is bright pink spikes and one of her legs has been hacksawed off by Oliver just below the knee. I point out that at the very least this compromises the swimming feature and that perhaps fifty pence would be more appropriate. ‘No, we’ll start at £10 and see where we go from there,’ says Emily.

Oliver is selling a pair of rugby boots for £5 which he thinks is a bargain. I point out that they have limited appeal without studs, but he says they are still good quality and new studs are easily available. Presumably the coating of vintage mud adds to their appeal.

We have a selection of old mugs, some books, a motley selection of soft toys in various shades of grey and some pebbles that Emily has collected from the garden and decorated. As original pieces of art, these have been priced at anything between £1.50 and £75.

Our pricing is clearly putting off prospective customers and after half an hour the children are complaining about being bored. I resort to some old fashioned barrow boy tactics and start calling out: ‘Credit crunch busting bargains, everything must go, all offers considered’. Well, of course, the children are horrified and by the time I’ve got into the swing of things, they’re cowering with embarrassment in the front seat of the car. But it’s done the trick and within minutes I’ve raked in 25 pence for a headless Action Man and 75 pence for a dog-eared copy of ‘A Guide to Steam on the Settle to Carlisle Railway’ to a man who was disappointed that I didn’t also have an edition of ‘Diesel Multiple Units on Branch Lines of the North West’. I try to interest him in a couple of videos called ‘Thomas the tank engine and Percy get Dirty’ and ‘Thomas couples up with Annie & Clarabelle’ but it’s not the sort of thing he’s he’s in to.

After an hour we have more than covered our costs and are ready to call it quits but we’re penned in by other cars and have to wait to make a break for it. I split the proceeds between the children and send them off to visit the other stalls. Within ten minutes they have both spent every penny and return with more things than we originally sold.

Later, as I am lying in the shade recovering from the combined effects of too much sun on my head at the car boot sale, the chocolate overdose and too much wine, there’s a commotion from the other side of the garden followed by some frantic shouting.

Our friends have come to stay the night and brought their six month old Border Collie. Apparently he’s never come across chickens before. Suddenly from behind the hedge comes a frantic Rhode Island Red hen followed by an ecstatic collie followed by a red faced brunette. Moments later, the brunette and the Rhode Island Red are out if sight but the collie comes racing back in the opposite direction in pursuit of a squawking bantum, chased by a blonde with a stick. By the time the dog has been cornered, he’s done two full rounds of the garden, taken a mouthful of feathers out of the backside of one hen and chased another two up in to the trees. Wendy and I are aching with laughter and I’m suddenly feeling much better.

Next day, we’ve organised a lunch and Easter Egg hunt for eighteen friends and as many children. The sun is still shining and we decide to eat outside. Wendy has downloaded an elaborate egg-cum-treasure hunt with clues, graphics, the lot. It’s obviously designed for children but I cannot get my head round how the whole thing is supposed to work. Despite this, I am charged with the task of setting it all up. Emily, who has been outside since nine looking for eggs in vain, sidles up to me and says, ‘Daddy, you know I have a very bad memory.’

‘Do you darling?’

‘Yes, so if I help you hide all the Easter eggs, I am sure I shall have completely forgotten where they all are by the time the children get here.’

I explain to her the complexities of Mummy’s egg hunt and she simply says, ‘what on earth was wrong with just chucking them all over the garden like we usually do?’

I try my best, but the complexity of setting up the hunt gets the better of me and eventually I have to delegate. Despite my obvious intellectual shortcomings, it proves a great success and everyone is happy.

Lunch goes well, the sun keeps shining and by tea time I’m ready for a lie down. I’ve stayed off the chocolate, but in an attempt to stay hydrated I’ve mistakenly been downing the Proseccho instead of the Pelligrino sparkling water. This on top of the fact that I have not been wearing a hat and forgot the sun cream, means that I am wiped out. The only thing for it is to retreat indoors for a cup of tea which, of course, needs chocolate on the side.

Perhaps there’s an upside to Easter after all.