Saturday, 1 March 2008

Jackie and I took a drive to the church at Ayot St Peter. We took a stroll around the church admiring its charming clock and its perfect proportions. But we couldn’t go inside. Not so very long ago it was unheard of for a church to be locked at any time: they were always open for the faithful to pray and for the faithless to admire the architecture and history. No more. Every church is now closed like a fist against casual visitors.

This set me thinking about our own policy at Watford CVS: should we leave our door open to visitors even when there is no-one on reception, or should we lock the door and ask visitors to ring the doorbell?

Jackie and I drove on to Kings Walden and Manor Gardens Nursery. Isobel is a truly original and wonderful character and her garden centre is an absolute joy: highly independent and eccentric. Along with a few plants we bought a trug and some ancient straw baskets - but resisted the lure of the mobile commode.

After this, we drove back through Kimpton and Codicot to Shaw’s Corner and then for lunch to the Brocket Arms where landlord Toby Wingfield-Digby is another great character.

The countryside was perfect: farms and market gardens and water cress lakes, villages, parks and country estates. We saw an alien Muntjack deer and a very indigenous Hare. Hertfordshire is not a “high maintenance” County; there are no dramatic mountains or boastful forests or vain lakes and Hertfordshire doesn’t constantly need to be told how beautiful she is. She is a modest county, reserved and seemly. But she knows her worth and every now and then she gives you a gentle nudge as if to say: “I am beautiful, you know”.