Irises at Old Washington Hall

Today we travelled south for a weekend in North Yorkshire. We broke our journey with a visit to Old Washington Hall. This National Trust property is the ancestral home of George Washington. There were only two other couples on site at the same time as us, so we made the most of easy access to the exhibits (very few of which were original) and guides.

The big surprise of the afternoon was the discovery that the 'first' Washington ancestor came from the village where I spent most of my childhood. I'm astonished that we never learnt about him at school. There would have been a great opportunity to draw attention to his part in history during the 1977 celebrations of the bicentenary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

Our weekend accommodation is 'The shed'. It's is a very cool barn conversion on a working farm. There is a lot of space here for two couples, both indoors and out.

The Foxes were delayed by heavy traffic coming out of Manchester and into Leeds, so they arrived a couple of hours after us. Once they were through the door, however, the weekend fun began. We had curries for supper, then Mr hazelh, Mr Fox and I settled down for two of games of Catan while Clarissa read. My gaming companions ganged up on me to win a game each. I will get my revenge at some point...

I photographed the irises at Old Washington Hall.

Exercise today: small amount of walking (6497 steps).