Tuesday 10th July 2023
Christine was up at the crack of dawn to join Jane and her childhood friend Jo for a beach walk with the three dogs, obviously Tom-Tom and Rosie were besides themselves when we got back yesterday, and they were the same this morning so a good beach walk will calm them down. This worked well; whilst Christine had her nails done, I took them to the local park but the last thing they wanted to do was run about!!!!
Back home in time to enjoy the pasties we bought from the “Pasty Shop” in Port Issac for lunch, we also had the “team” back to complete our bedroom wardrobe doors and we’d also arranged for our last hall door to be delivered. Everything had to be squeezed in including the washing etc; it has to be done as we’re off again tomorrow to London via a night just outside Burford. We’ve also got to sort out guest room as we have dog sitters whilst in London.
Wednesday 11th July 2023
With all the work done, car packed we waited for our dog sitters to arrive mid morning. This is a new experience for us but was recommended to this idea by friends; fingers crossed🤞🤞🤞
Our dog sitters arrived on time and after introducing them to the dogs and settling them in we hit the road: Cirencester for lunch today at “The Bear”, another “Butcombe” pub that offers its members 25% discount on food every Wednesday!!
After a very pleasant drive through the Cotswolds with a detour to Jeremy Clarkson’s Diddly Squat farm shop; good gracious cars everywhere, and the queue to get into the shop was long, we took a picture and headed off again through beautiful Bidbury and arrived at our hotel for the night; “The Inn Of All Seasons”, tonight we are on a fact-finding mission as we are looking for a suitable venue to celebrate my 80th. When we booked we chose one of the dog rooms but not having them we tried to change to a normal room but alas, all pre-booked; getting into this hotel is difficult as it is so popular. One reason for its popularity is the history of the place as well it’s location as the gateway into the Cotswolds.
The original part of the Inn, now the bar area, was built in the 1500s and started out as quarry cottages housing quarry men and their families employed by the Barrington Estate and quarrying Cotswold stone. With the arrival of the highway in the 1700’s the building became a coaching inn and later extended to accommodate coaching passengers and other travellers travelling between London, Oxford, the West and Wales. The Inn’s current Coach House is to the east side of the main building and dates back to the 1870s; it has now been converted into comfortable guest accommodation. During the stage coach era it was known as “The New Inn” and provided an essential stopping place for horses, carriages, stage coaches etc., and today the “Inn For All Seasons” still provides hospitality to travellers, but this time for motorists!!
In 1960 The Barrington Estate sold “The New Inn” to Jeremy Taylor, The “Horse Master”, a well known figure in the film industry providing horses for period films from The Man For All seasons to Lawrence of Arabia and everything in between. In homage to Jeremy’s career, the name was changed in the late 60’s to “The In For All Seasons” (from his film A Man For All Seasons) and it has now been sympathetically but substantially updated for the modern day traveller, yet still retaining many of its original features. The current owners, Eddie and Melanie Hillier, very experienced hoteliers bought the hotel in December 2016.
We stayed in one of the outbuildings, very comfortable and of course perfect the dogs we didn’t have!!! Being a Wednesday night, the restaurant wasn’t to busy but never less the food was excellent, the chef did us proud. After dinner I stayed around the bar getting the “low-down” on the place whilst Christine, being tired, headed off to bed.
Tomorrow we head to London to meet Andrew and Elton, returning home Saturday.