Christmas at Hughenden

14.12.20
Last year a real highlight was a Christmas visit to Hughenden Manor with my mum. It was magical, decorated as it would have been for a 1940s Christmas. All homemade and beautiful.
We had assumed that none of the National Trust houses would be open this Christmas so were delighted to see that Hughenden was open and decorated for Christmas.
Mr K needed to collect Marshall today and mum and I needed to drive separately to Hughenden and Miss L needed to be taken to school. All a bit of a logistical nightmare!
The solution was for me and Mr K to take Miss L to school and then carry on the dealer near Banbury and then me leave Mr K there until Marshall was ready and carry on down the M40 to Hughenden. I’d booked entry for 10-1030am so it all worked out fine. And luckily for Mr K he hardly had to wait any time at all. I had visions of him being sat there all day!
It was lovely to be back at Hughenden. It wasn’t as decorated as last year and upstairs wasn’t open but it was fab seeing all the trees.
During the Second World War Hughenden was the secret home of map making operations. It was only discovered in 2004 when a National Trust volunteer overheard a visitor telling his grandson that he’d worked at Hughenden making maps during the war. They’d all signed the Official Secrets Act and no one knew about it, even the National Trust who’d owned the house for years.
There’s a fantastic display set up showing the rooms they worked in, the equipment, the maps they made. So interesting.
After we’d looked around we had a mooch round the bookshop and then lunch in the stables. Yummy!
We headed back up to the car park through the kitchen garden and orchard and as it was still early we decided to go for a walk round the estate. It was very muddy and very lovely. And as luck would have it we ended up right back at the stables cafe so I could get myself a cup of tea for the journey home.
I took the scenic route home which I’d missed this morning and wasn’t late to pick up Miss L.
All in all a pretty good day!