Walking in the bluebells

I love May, it's my birthday month, Chelsea Flower Show, weather gets warmer and of course beautiful bluebells in Cobham Woods in Kent and my favourite place to walk.

Today we made the most of the lovely weather, packed up my backpack with some food and a flask of tea and off we drove to Cobham Woods. All four of us in my little Ka because Ians car is in the garage. The ancient woods covering 190 acres is a sight of special scientific interest located within the Kent Downs where a white stag is said to roam, not that we've ever seen it. But we do see the cattle that graze there sometimes walking along a pathway or grazing in one of the clearings. It is one of the very few ancient wood pastures still retaining it's full structure of open grassland and bramble. Wood is copiced here too, there are log piles dotted about and a wood yard.

Today the mausoleum was open to the public by The National Trust , just £2 entrance fee or free to National Trust members . Ian remembers it more than me but it lay derelict after the second world war then was vandalised badly and left with no floor after a fire and just a shell. A few years ago it was restored for around a million pounds by the Cobham Ashenbank Management Scheme then a big security fence erected.

This year Gravesham Borough Council said it had to be removed so plans began to open it to the public and today was the first time in many years that we actually got a chance to step inside. The stone masons did a fantastic job and the stained glass made reflections on the stone floor. It was built in 1767 at the instructions of the 3rd lord Darnley to be built as a family burying place after his death, but it was never actually used as a burial chamber by the Danley family because it was never consecrated. Instead it became a landscape feature in the wood outside the historic parkland in Cobham Hall.