Annual Wassail celebrations took place in Somerset last week with the nearest to Dulcote being held in Godney.
Tradition demands that a shotgun is fired into the oldest tree in the orchard to ward off evil spirits accompanied by song and all present drink, of course, hot mulled cider, all taking place under the watchful eye of the Green Man
Hopefully we will have another good harvest in 2016
Finally we are having crisp cold mornings here in Dulcote with a couple of nights reaching “minus” Celsius. A bit of a shock after so long but certainly welcome.
Walking Bob in the morning there is a frost in the fields and along pathways, and it looks beautiful in the half morning light. Wish I had a photo to share with you but, to ensure I’m back in time to get the children out of bed for school, it just is a little too early to get anything worthwhile……
I was delighted at the weekend to find out that The White House Bed and Breakfast has won a booking.com Guest Review Award. for an overall score of 9.6 across a total of 73 reviews.
A huge thank you to all of our booking.com guests for showing their appreciation of our efforts.
I was intrigued by a conversation I had with a colleague earlier today and couldn’t wait to get back home to try it out……
Apparently google have come up with an alternative to replace the complicated geo-co-ordinate numbering system to help you navigate to where you need to be when visiting unfamiliar places. The system, called what3words.com, uses three words to navigate you to within 3 square meters of your destination. The site also allows you to navigate to the pin and also share the pin location.
Given that the whole of Dulcote shares the same postcode, and this postcode sends you to the opposite end of the village to The White House, some of our visitors in the past have experienced problems finding us, especially in the dark.
Our new swinging sign seems to have resolved this problem but I remained interested in finding what the three words might be for The White House.
Having switched on my computer this evening, I eagerly accessed the site to find our three words are:
softly.positives.units
Could have been a lot worse………………………………………..
The White House would like to wish all of our friends, family and guests a Happy New Year and we hope 2016 is a good one for all of you. It certainly passed very quickly for us and while the holiday season seemed to be dominated by news of Britain being drenched and battered by storms, here in Somerset we were lucky enough to miss this very bad weather.
And now, while the Christmas Markets have packed up and disappeared, The Somerset Farmers Markets continue and are definitely worth a visit. There are 16 in total (see www.somersetfarmersmarkets.co.uk for further details of all of them) but those most local to us are:
We are just about to sign off until after the Christmas and New Year break and would like to wish all of our friends and the wonderful guests who have stayed with us since our opening in May a very merry Christmas. The tree is up, the Christmas parties have started, the children are excited, but the nicest thing so far has been our very first visit to a bell ringing tower in Croscombe Church.
Towards the end of November we started, as a family, to attend bell ringing classes, a new after school activity at Wells Cathedral School. The hobby already has us hooked, although it is much more difficult than you can imagine. We aren’t yet good enough to be let loose on the bells alone, but yesterday we were invited to watch actual bell ringing in practice at a local Church. The experience of climbing the very steep and narrow medieval staircase and hearing the bells from inside the tower was exhilarating. The bells are extremely heavy and everyone worked so hard, so, when you hear those wonderful sounds over Christmas, spare a thought, and maybe a mince pie and something warming, for those wonderful bell ringers!
The children have now finished school and my daughter and I spent a happy afternoon yesterday bottling the Sloe Gin and Plum Brandy we have been lovingly nurturing since picking the fruit in the Autumn.
At the time it seemed such a long time until Christmas but all of a sudden it is almost with us.
Of course Rod and I had to try them both out, and we still have the Blackberry Vodka to bottle so all set for a very merry Christmas…..
What a difference a day makes – or more accurately a three hour appointment at the Puppy Beauty Parlour…….
Granted Bob has been digging in the vegatable patch in pouring rain in the “before” picture, but he was SOOOO scruffy we were embarrassed to drop him off for his wash and trim.
Anyway, the lady did a great job and he came back looking fantastic!
What a beautiful weekend we had here at The White House in Dulcote. The weather was glorious and we packed loads in; including a visit to the Wells Food Festival and a new load of jam making after a trip to Wookey Hole to collect blackberries.
The Food Festival was very busy and the smells from the numerous stalls were divine. We came home with bags loaded with goodies, including local cheeses and dried meats. Just managed to resist temptation to buy a huge plum pudding for Christmas Day but only after confirming we could also buy online at a later date!
Wookey Hole was awash with Blackberries and although I was on my own for this trip; a waddle of Geese and herd of young cows kept me company (or watched over me to make sure I didn’t take too many) and so Sunday evening was spent making 10 huge pots of Blackberry and Apple jelly (using the lovely Bramleys that Ros gave to me last week from her garden)
And just before we settled in for the evening my daughter Lucy took this lovely photo which really captures just how special a weekend it was.
Although today is the first day in October, the sun has finally decided to shine on us her at The White House and we are enjoying balmy days although the temperature is beginning to dip in the evenings.
Reading the latest edition of Somerset Life there is an article focusing on Autumn days out and its good to see Bishops Palace within their recommendations. With 14 acres of gardens and our famous springs that give Wells its name, it makes a great day out. And if you are lucky you might even see the swans ringing the bell for food. My daughter Melanie and I were lucky enough to see this last summer and there’s a great clip on you tube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stGckjlM2tU so that you can see what you are missing……