It’s raining while I type. Normally, this would be depressing. By the beginning of May, there should be more consistent sunshine.

But my topic for today is a visit to the National Trust property Tyntesfield, near Bristol, which we visited back at Easter, when the weather was worse. The rain today is helping jog memories.

The trip started by scraping snow off the car. Which just tells you what sort of a day it was shaping up to be. It wasn’t an all-day visit, so we weren’t up and out at the crack of dawn. It was more of a stretch-the-legs-and-have-some-lunch on our way to visit family for the Easter weekend. We’ve been before, so we didn’t feel like we had to explore everything.

The weather hadn’t improved by the time we arrived, a couple of hours later, though there was no more snow. It was still freezing cold, so out came all the coats, gloves, snoods, hats, spare jumpers. I’m surprised we could walk, especially Tiny, being so wrapped up in layers.

Naturally, we started in the cafe for a cup of tea and warm food (sausage rolls: delicious! Though not as good as a beef ragu cheese toastie we’ve previously found at Dinefwr, but nowhere else. And not on our last trip to Dinefwr). Also, you enter the property by what were the stables, now converted to shop and cafe. There’s another cafe on the other side of the gardens, with a small play-area for the children.

But we had puddles to jump in, and hail to avoid, before we reached that one.

We were only there for about three hours in all, and in that time the weather cycled through rain, hail, sunshine, more rain, and a thunderstorm.

And I discovered that the soles of my boots (three months old) had worn and cracked, and by the time we returned to the car, I had wet socks. Cold, wet socks. (My subsequent trip to a Timpsons to get them fixed revealed that there are fixable soles, and unfixable soles. Guess which sort my boots had?!)

We carelessly did not seek shelter in the house, instead opting for a walk to the kitchen garden on the far side of the estate. We found greenhouses instead, although the Orangery was closed. We definitely felt that we had earned ourselves another cup of tea and some cake (sponge for M and brownie for me and Tiny) by the time we returned to the stable cafe.

It was a good stop-over, even with the ghastly weather and the hole in my boot. We’ll probably make it again, next time we’re passing. Much nicer, anyway, than a boring old service station. Better food, better scenery. And free to enter, with our National Trust membership, which has now paid for itself this year.