The Journey Home

After a wonderful meal last night and a delightful sleep with a cool fan making the bedroom a tolerable temperature in the midst of this heatwave, I woke up at 5.30am and edited some of Friday's photos but didn't manage to get them all done by the time Drew awoke at 6.15am and I made a cup of tea for Drew and I.

I showered, shaved and brushed my teeth, then Drew bathed and did his ablutions. By 7.15am we were ready to go down for breakfast but restrained ourselves until the official opening time of 7.30am.

Breakfast

The breakfast at Whatley Manor provides a wide selection of items to eat.

There is a table full of delectable items, seen from various angles below:

We began with orange juice for both of us and tea, for me and coffee, for Drew along with wholemeal toast for me and white toast for Drew.

Drew choose a Yogurt with Honey and Apple

while I tested the kitchen by ordering porridge the Scottish way with just hot water and salt cooked with the oats. The hotel's menu had suggested it with milk, honey and whipped Crème fraîche, but were more than happy to make it the way I like it.

For our second course we had similar breakfast, neither of us liking baked beans, but loving everything else. I had my egg fried 'over hard' and Drew had his eggs scrambled.

The sausage was juicy, the black pudding rich, the bacon beautifully salty and the eggs cooked to perfection. A wonderful meal.

Homeward Bound

We went back up to the room after breakfast and completed our packing before leaving Whatley Manor at 8:50am for the 58-mile journey home. 

The journey was uneventful. 

Final Charge 

We arrived back in Tongwynlais and took advantage of the BP Pulse charger at the Holiday Inn at the end of the village to top the car up. It is 83.2 miles since the last charge in Trowbridge. 

Another advantage of the Holiday Inn as a charging place is that they serve Starbucks in the hotel, so we sat and ended out holiday with good coffee. 

Why charge the car before going home I hear you ask. Well, that means I can charge it to the Holiday Budget rather than the regular household budget. I know I could do that anyway, but it is the principle that counts. 

So, this is the end of the holiday. But it is worth noting, especially for our regular readers, that this isn't the last trip we will be doing this year.

An extension for this blog

Having completed the Cardiff Half Marathon last March, Drew was really tempted by the Copenhagen Half Marathon. [Co-pilot's notes: I believe dear readers, that the true reason will become apparent in about 44 words.]

As we planned to visit Scandanavia in 2020 and due to Covid we never got there, I thought it would be good to combine a visit to Denmark's capital with Drew given that, as well as being a famous city, it is also Scandinavia's foodie capital.

So, this blog will have an extended life and in Mid-September will reappear with Copenhagen as its destination - even though the blog's title will remain the same. 

We are staying at the Axel Guldsmeden hotel in the Vesterbro district of Copenhagen and have already booked four restaurants for the nine nights we are there. 

So, I hope to see many of you with us again then. Though people looking for half marathon tips might not find the blog a useful guide.

Returning to the Dining Room at Whatley Manor

On the 29th of July last year we made our first visit to Whatley Manor for the tasting menu in their restaurant called simply 'The Dining Room'.  

Last July, Niall Keating was Executive Chef here, but he left at the end of last year. He was replaced by the former Head Chef Ricki Weston. We met Ricki last year when he served us the early courses of the menu.

Ricki Weston - July 2021

Seeing him behind the pass in charge of his own brigade, it looks like the move has been good for him. It looked like he had grown a few inches and spent some time in the gym, as he led his team tonight. We had a few seconds to chat to him while his team worked around us. It is a really impressive achievement on his part that within weeks of being appointed to the role he had gained a Michelin Star.

Pre-Dinner

Dinner began with drinks in the lounge at 6:30am I opted for Elderflower Presse and Drew had Ginger Ale.

These were served with a light bite of tapioca crisps and hummus. The barman amused as he put them down said: 'just what you need before a ten-course meal'. Though in fact they were light and tasty with a soft texture to the hummus, a perfect start or what was to come. 

Into the Kitchen

Drinks finished we were led into the kitchen, by the hotel's Deputy General Manager, Attila Tornyi. He even showed us some of his tray whirling skills learnt back home in Hungary.

We stood at the tables set up in the kitchen for this part of the meal.

And this year it was another young member of the team's opportunity to serve us. I wonder, if we will bring him the progress Ricki got out of meeting us last year. 😉

Ricki has made a clear impact on the menu, which is noticeably different from last year, but all the innovation seems to have been positive. This was evidenced by these first two dishes.

The first dish was called beetroot with suet, pine and thyme. This was an amazingly delicate beetroot pie, with the crust made of suet. The pine and thyme were on fire below the pie to add their wonderful smell to the eating experience. It was astounding to watch smoke coming up from our plate but the pie was easy to eat and full of amazing flavours.

The second dish, called beef from the manor with date and whey, this saw some more Tapioca, this time a black tapioca and on top was some delicate beef tartare with dates, sorrel, marigold and tiny pieces of whey - Placing it on the tongue and having a pop of tapioca before the rich flavours was such a treat. It was one of those moments when it felt like time stopped as the flavours exploded - but it wasn't enough time, as the flavours faded from the tongue, but will live a lot longer on the memory.

The Dining Room

After the two taste treats, we were taken through to the dining room by Clare, the Dining Room Manager, for the next three plates.

First, was the dish called potato, skate and grenobloise, this was a tasty morsel with the skate and grenobloise inside the spiralised potato cases, the butter, capers, parsley and lemon of the grenobloise, enhanced the gentle softness of the skate and the crispy potato provided an excellent contrast with the insides.     

The chestnut mushrooms with truffle and Jerusalem artichoke was the next little bite, this mix of flavours were delightful, crisp and amazing - our tongues went zing, zing as we tasted it.

The lobster bisque and caviar was the third of these little delights. The N25 caviar was salty rich with the thick lobster bisque underneath the caviar, they were both delicious, but together they were really stunning.  

Bread

Before we moved to our larger courses, we were served a white rye sourdough with a delightful malted butter ring, this was a beurre noisette heavily whipped to make this butter more nutty than buttery, which suits my taste perfectly. And, as my sister is bound to ask, yes, I did nibble of the herbs in the middle of the butter, they were too good to leave as a decoration. 

Third Course 

I don't know whether to call the next course the sixth course or the third, as it is the sixth different taste since the beginning of the meal, but I guess we can count the first two appetisers served in the kitchen as one course and the next three at the table as the second, which makes this scallop course the third!

The scallop was served with crème fraiche and trout roe. My initial reaction was Wow, Wow, Wow and it remains that way now. [Co-pilot's note: He got, dear readers, a touch excitable at the time. Closing his eyes and humming!] 

It was as amazing as it looks. The scallop was in slices with scallop mousse and crème fraiche with sharpness from the berries and trout roe and other garden herbs - to borrow the words of the film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, it was truly scrumptious.

Fourth Course

The next course was Jacobs’ ladder with burnt leek, aged parmesan and truffle. Many of my friends will be surprised by this, but I don't have words to tell you how wonderful this is!! But I'll try my best. 

It had an amazing depth of flavour on the wonderful tender beef, the parmesan and truffle themselves were delightful but combined with the meat were enough to have me almost crying with delight. [Co-pilot's note: I had twelve courses of this, dear readers!!]

Next, came a beef and ginger consommé, though it was better descried as a traditional beef tea with the tea imbibed with radish, ginger and lemon. It was delicious; warm with a sense it was health giving and a perfect palette cleanser between the beef and the fish.

[Co-pilot's note: My Nanny Burrows, dear reader, used to swear by an Oxo cube in hot water!!!]

Fifth Course

The fish course was wild bass with gooseberry, grape and hollandaise.  A lovely piece of bass with a crispy skin of excellent quality. It would have been enough on its own, but with the soft fish, just cooked, almost translucent and the nuttiness of the almond volute, I was sighing with pleasure.

Sixth Course

Next came the main meat course of the meal. A delightful piece of aged lamb with lamb fat potato and pesto. The Lamb was cooked together with chicken mousse, I assume as a ballotine, by cooking them together the flavours combined with strong aged lamb and soft mousse served with a rich lamb jus. There were also three delightful parcels of pesto over cucumber with marigold and dill. The fat potato brought another dimension of lamb flavour to the dish, a great triumph. 

Seventh Course

Friends of mine will know that the worse crime in the culinary world for me is for people to mess with cheese in a way which dilutes the flavour of the cheese by adding too many sweet elements to the dish. This meant that when I read the words 'Baron Bigod with bacon, berkswell and apple' I was nervous, that the Baron Bigod, one of those raw cow milk Brie style British cheeses that I absolutely love, might be ill-treated. I should have had more trust in Ricki and his brigade. This was the exact opposite of my fears, the chef has made the cheese even better with his magic touch. 

The Baron Bigod was combined with the Berkswell, a hard ewe's milk cheese. The delicious saltiness of the bacon jam and tasty bacon pieces through the cheese added to by the small flakes of sharp granny smith apple made the whole dish amazingly tasty. 

Eighth Course

The first of the dessert courses came next. It was a 75% Chocolate with blackberry and sweet woodruff. The chocolate and blackberry were combined with a twig of chocolate on top and was mouth-watering. The sweet Woodruff ice cream was no sweeter than the herb itself and was enhanced with the Oabika gel (the white pulp of the cocoa bean) in the centre adding another cocoa flavour to the whole dish.

Ninth Course

The final course was a second dessert, in many restaurants Drew is forced to eat both the desserts for both of us, as I don't like sweet food. But he didn't have to help out here. The plum, custard and apple blossom were just satisfyingly tasty not sugary at all. 

The sharp plum gel had a white chocolate tweel between it and the sweet pink plum with the addition of a ginger crumb, a real delight and pleasure. I concluded at the end of this meal that this chef is a genius!! 

Coffee 

We finished dinner with espressos in the lounge, the coffee was a strong bitter finish to a perfect meal. There wasn't one element that wasn't just perfect, something I don't often say about a meal.

A well-paced meal which we began with drinks at 6.30pm comes to a dreamy end at 10.30pm. A perfect end to the holiday. 

Journey to the Isle of Avalon

Today, we travelled to the mythical Isle of Avalon, which is also the very real town of Glastonbury.

 

But before we hear more about Glastonbury, time for a brief review of earlier in the morning.

Breakfast

As today is our last day in Exmouth, as tends to happen, I woke up earlier than usual at 4.30am. So, having put hot water on my Weetabix, I named and uploaded the photos on to Flickr and drafted the blog post about yesterday and began the process of cleaning up the accommodation.

A few days ago, I mentioned the shower (or rather showers) in the house - there is one downstairs and one upstairs. Both have the kind of showerheads I've only previously come across in hotels. i.e. double heads: one static and one flexible.

Unfortunately, the only photo we have of it, doesn't show the static head, above the flexible one which you can see.

Those who have read my holiday blogs in the past, especially my travels in the USA, will know that static shower heads, very common in that country, don't suit me as they make it hard to get the flow in your armpits and under the groin. I'm not sure, without being able to do handstands, you can use these satisfactorily. So, I'm a strong supporter of the flexible heads, most common in the UK, which allows you to direct the water with more accuracy. Of course, double heads, that allow the benefit of a flow from above and a targeted flow are, to me, the best of all worlds. As already noted, I have seen these in the posher hotels, indeed they had them in Lympstone Manor, but not before in a home shower - guess what is now on my Christmas wish list (or at least on the list for when we redo the bathroom after replacing the window, which is planned to be done.   

Drew got up at 7am and had a bath, between the two of us we completed packing, washed the floor, bleached our cups - drinking tea in areas of hard water means it is the only way to remove the stains and put everything back in the order we found it.

The Sand House has been a great house in terms of location and especially because of the ease of charging the car, the two factors which led us to book it, plus the lovely shower which was a bonus. Every time we looked for something, bin bags, cleaning materials, it was all there. We have been very impressed. There are rooms in the house that we only visited when we took the first photos of the house and checked that all was well at the end, it is clearly too big for us and has crockery and cutlery for ten or more people, but while there was some wasted space, it was excellent in terms of access to Exmouth and the walks in the surrounding area and has been a real home from home.  

Leaving Exmouth

Back and ready we put the key back in the keylock and left the house at 9am. This is the route we followed (for the whole day).  

Selecting the no motorway option on the map we had a pleasant journey through Devon and Somerset countryside and towns until arriving at Glastonbury at 10.50am.

About Glastonbury

Drew, when we had been travelling down the M5 on our way to Exmouth on the first day of the holiday mentioned, as we went past the direction sign, that he had never been to Glastonbury, as it happens neither had I. So, in planning today, with a 3pm check-in at our destination it made sense to stop for a time and we agreed we couldn't think of a better place than Glastonbury.

One of the reasons Drew suggested Glastonbury is that he has recently finished two series of Bernard Cornwell books, that I read some years ago, the first about Merlin, Arthur etc and the second about an archer and his search for the Grail. This focus on the cauldron and grail is like Glastonbury itself, where Celtic (largly Welsh) traditions about the Cauldron (For more on the cauldron read this article) then transforms in a Christian tradition linked with the Chalice in which Jesus turned wine into his blood and which legend said caught the last of his life blood as it dripped from his side (for more on the Grail read this one). The fact that the Grail is linked to Joseph of Arimathea in whose tomb Jesus was buried, before his resurrection, brings the link back to Glastonbury as Joseph the local legend says came to Glastonbury after the death of Jesus with his followers and 'the blessed cup'. 

My own interest in the town had been peaked by three of my colleagues, two of whom, Robin Croft and Heather Skinner, are among my closest friends, writing an article about the way the monks promoted Glastonbury. The article called: "And did those feet? Getting medieval England “on-message”" was in the Journal of Communication Management in 2008 and its abstract is available here. It makes the point that whose relics you had and how significant they might be were key parts in successful monastic development:

Glastonbury Abbey worked in partnership with the Crown to develop a detailed promotional campaign based on powerful narratives. As a consequence, it was able to grow to become one of the wealthiest communities in the country. The Crown, meanwhile, consolidated its position by being able to engender a whole national “brand” around the mythical corpus.

They see the King Arthur 'find' at Glastonbury as part of this story, enabling the abbey to increase revenue at a time when it was in some disfavour with the crown.

Robin went on to undertake additional research which led to the book chapter in Consumption and Spirituality (2001) which is called "The Veneration of Relics at Glastonbury Abbey in the Middle Ages" which discusses the way relics become commodities in monastic houses with the 'better' ones drawing in more money.

In addition, Robin tells me that Glastonbury imported 6 feet of topsoil for their graveyard, so they could add a second story of bodies, as being buried near the relics of the saints made you more likely to rise with them when the Last Trumpet sounds (1 Corinthians 15:52). This was big business in its day.

Glastonbury

As Drew often mentioned as we strolled around the town: "It is a funny place". [Co-pilot's note: I beleive, dear readers, I may have been a little less polite!] As a centre of religious significance since Celtic times it has a strong presence of religion. With Christianity having been the dominant form for most of its known history. Indeed, the hostelry called the George Hotel and Pilgrims' Inn has been a lodging house of Christian pilgrim visitors since the 1400s and welcome peoples of all faiths and none these days.

Many of the shops on the main streets are devoted to some of the varying faiths. Like this example called Star Child, which reflects the hippy, modern pagen, wicca kind of background.

Crystals, chimes and joss sticks seem to be more common on these streets than pasties and bread. But note the pasties and sausage rolls that are for sale have a higher incidence of vegan versions than elsewhere and the bread will include spelt, einkorn and gluten free varieties. Please note I'm not being judgemental I love spelt and einkorn flours and have had some delicious vegan meals. The description is just to give a flavour of the town.

I particularly liked one image in one of the town's shops:

St. John the Baptist's Church

Our first stop in Glastonbury, right in front of the Car Park we used, was in St. John the Baptist's Church.

This imposing Church was built in 950 CE by St. Dunstan, Abbot of Glastonbury, subsequently Archbishop of Cantabury. The Church was enlarged by the Norman's in the 1100s and the tower built in 1475. The church was designed as a pilgrims' church with the Abbey church being used for visits, but primarily for the monks of the abbey, so a public church was needed in the town. There are 60 photos of the church, including some helpful explanatory boards, available on Flickr. Click on this link and click/swipe left to see the rest. 

Glastonbury Abbey

We arrived at the Abbey just before 11.30am and, after paying our fees, were encouraged to go on a free walking tour with a guide dressed up as a Medieval goodwife. 

The guide took us first to St. Patrick's Chapel behind the current abbey entrance. 

This chapel has some modern stained glass windows celebrating saints connected with Glastonbury - St. Jospeh of Arimathea is in the left pain, with Mary and the child Jesus above; St. Patrick's is in the next frame, with him treading on the serpents as he drove them out of Ireland. St. Dunstan is depicted in the third frame, fighting off the devil who came to Glastonbury to tempt the monks and pilgrims. The right frame depicts St. George and the dragon above and St. Brigid (note the characteristic Corn Cross in her hand. 

Along with replicas of Medieval wall art, this one depicting a number of the Abbots of Glastonbury including St. Dunstan with the Church in his hand and the last Abbot Richard Whiting who was hang drawn and quartered for not reneging on his faith.

The chapel also has a window with small pieces of rediscovered medieval glass form the abbey site.

From St. Patrick's Chapel, we went to the ruins of the Lady Chapel with its great door still retaining some of its original artwork.

It is a large space and the second image below shows how it was likely to have looked if you had arrived a tired and weary pilgrim at this great shrine which competed with Canterbury for being the greatest in England.

From the Lady chapel we were taken to the Abbot's Kitchen. Which was the only building not to lose its roof, and subsequently to decay and crumble, during the Reformation. This was due to the roof being stone, rather than Lead. Lead was a precious metal for builders, so was all taken away, whereas the Abbot's Kitchen survived and became over time, among other things, a Quaker Prayer Room.

Tour over we began to explore for ourselves and between the ruins, the monastic herb garden, the orchard and the monastic fishpond we have 111 photos of the Abbey and its grounds and museum. You can see them all on Flickr, this is the first one, you know what to do to see the rest!

The road from Glastonbury

We left Glastonbury at 1pm and headed to Trowbridge, Wiltshire

This was a little deviation from the direct route, but I'd identified an Instavolt Charging Station there and 89.3 miles into our journey it was a good point to charge the car.

The station was in a retail park, so we headed to the Costa Coffee for a coffee while we awaited the charge.

33 minutes and 17.25 kilowatts later (£9.83) we were back on the road.

We arrived at Whatley Manor, our destination for tonight, at 3.30pm ready for a rest, refresh and dinner. Details of dinner will follow in the next blog post.