Day 63 in the Cornwall House. It’s 2 months now since we chucked in the ‘day jobs’, left a much loved house in Oxfordhshire and moved lock, stock and toddler down to the far west of Cornwall. To Pengelly Mill.
It seems like a good time to start a Postcards from Pengelly blog. If only I could work out how to use WordPress. Good lord, it’s complicated. Or maybe my brain has gone to pot with all the sea air. One day I’ll be an expert (smug) blogger writing posts about ‘How to get the best from your blog’ but meanwhile back to the Buddhas.
We have a lot of them. “Lots and lots of Buddhas” as Aggie likes to chant. She also likes to give the Buddhas presents including stones, leaves and plastic balls. What the Buddhas think of this is unknown.
Pengelly Mill has fantastic, quirky and in places raging out of control 4.5 acres of Asian-inspired gardens created by the previous owner. And that means many a Buddha. Luckily we like the Buddhas. Here are three of them. I like to think of them as “Happy Buddha”, “Serene Buddha” and “Grumpy Buddha”. Can you spot which one is which?
As well as Buddhas we have a lake, ponds and waterfall, a secret/completely overgrown Thai garden, wild meadows and wildlife. I am steadily learning more about British wildlife. I thought I was reasonably good on African wildlife after 12 years in the Africa programme at Audley. Apparently I’m a bit rubbish on their British counterparts. Visiting friends shrieked with laughter when I called newts “tadpoles with arms” and a resident grey heron a “stork”. “Was it carrying a baby in it’s beak?” they queried.
Leaving office jobs and officially ‘not working’ makes it sound like we should be living the good life. And we are living the good life in a beautiful place with wonderful beaches nearby – and no Sunday blues or 9 to 6. Not quite got our feet up yet though. Visitors to Pengelly say something along the lines of “Wow I have never seen anything like this”, “I am speechless”, “it’s a piece of paradise”, “it’s like another Lost Gardens of Heligan”. And then “ooh you’ve got a lot of work to do here”. Yes we do. A LOT. So if anyone would like a free gardening holiday… then we would welcome you with open arms!
We are also at square one when it comes to setting up our planned luxury glamping accommodation here at Pengelly. The much-loved Cornish word ‘dreckly’ springs to mind. And as it stands we don’t yet know if we can do anything with the land other than farm – or put Buddhas – on it.
More postcards to follow…