Frogmore House

Today (Thursday) we find ourselves at home in Windsor with no home-search duties - a day off! Back into it tomorrow, though.

This morning we walked up to the post office, bank and Cornish Pasty shop then decided to meander home through Park Street and down the Long Walk. We just never get tired of the lovely surroundings and view! There were cars on the walk (the Queen's driveway!) making their way down to Frogmore House, the beautiful 'country' home of Queens Mary, Charlotte and Alexandra, the Duchess of Kent, many other Royals over 400 years and most famously the Mausoleum of Queen Victoria and her beloved Prince Albert.

Built in c.1680, Frogmore is special because Queen Victoria loved it so much that she broke from tradition and planned to be buried there, instead of Westminster Abbey or St George's Chapel. Plans were privately underway well before her and Albert's deaths. The gardens are large and sometimes boggy (hence the name Frogmore), with interesting exotic foreign species and the Frogmore Lake wanders prettily through the property. It is only open a few days a a year and not really set up for the public. In fact the numbers through the house are limited. I think this made it more personal, like being granted special permission from the Queen herself.

I left Martin and James on the Long Walk and they returned home via the Coldstream Barracks and were excited to see the uniformed guards in their red coats and busbies as they exited Sheet Street and marched up to the High Street and Castle for the change-over at 11am. All this literally on our doorstep! James especially likes the boom-boom of the big drums! He waved to them - I wonder if he got a wink back?

So I bought my 3.50 ticket and walked into the grounds and firstly to the Royal Mausoleum. Not having been in a Mausoleum before I felt a little tentative. There weren't many people inside and the air was hushed and reverent. It is a truly beautiful building inside, the dome light-filled and covered in paintings, stained glass and there are angels everywhere you look. The huge central Aberdeen granite sarcophagi are enormous and eerily life-like. Prince Albert died in 1861 and Queen Victoria 40 years later in 1901. There were memorial tributes and other tombs within the small octagonal buidling, including the Queen's friend John Brown, and 35 year old Princess Alice holding her 4 year old child in death. She succumbed a few days after the child of the same illness and the marble monument was dedicated by her mother, Queen Victoria. It made me want to cry as mother and child looked comfortably but eternally asleep in each other's arms.

Back out into the bright sunshine and along the winding gravel paths to Frogmore House. The line of viewers snaked slowly through the lower floor of the house which was imposing and grand but not as over-the-top as I imagine some palaces would be. It really is a stately country home and the vistas over the lake and lush estate through the tall windows are lovely. Especially when the sun is shining and spilling warmth and light into the richly decorated rooms. Some of it was chintzy, some of it gaudy but these rooms are relatively untouched sine the mid-1800's. It was hard to place myself in the same room as royalty.

I walked back toward the entrance past the Gothic ruins, covered in masses of wisteria. The wisteria was so beautiful I almost forgot to look at the building beneath it!

It occured to me as I crossed the Walk, strolled up Brook Lane, right into Sheet Street and left towards home that I am extremely fortunate to be here. I am soaking up the history for all it's worth!

James is asleep and Martin has gone to Frogmore this afternoon. The weather is holding and I'm making soup. Bliss!

Here are some photos from Martin's visit this afternoon. They're a little out of order. Sorry - but is a Flickr thing. You can always view the album and look at the most recent. They're in order.