I’ve just got back from an interesting trip down memory lane – or, more specifically, a visit to the famous Chatsworth estate in Derbyshire.
I’ve blogged before about how separate visits to the same place can leave you with completely different impressions (see my posts on Madrid), but Derbyshire is different: it’s where I grew up and, despite numerous return trips to see my family since moving away 10 years ago, even to this day I tend to associate it with teenage boredom (it may be a county full of dramatic landscapes and picture-perfect villages, but when you’re 15 it’s difficult to see past the fact that it takes two buses and a long walk to get to the cinema).
So, when my parents suggested a walk around Chatsworth over the Christmas break, my first instinct was to say no – after all, I had been dragged around its seemingly endless maze of stately rooms and formal gardens enough times on school trips. But, having eaten one too many mince pies, I knew I needed a bit of exercise and begrudgingly tagged along.
I’m glad I did. Wandering along the banks of the meandering river, past grazing deer and crumbling water mills, with the monolithic Chatsworth House rising eerily out of the mist on the opposite bank, I began to appreciate the beauty which I had so often ignored. And I rediscovered some forgotten childhood memories – the fun I had hurtling down slides, swaying on ropes and clambering up trees in the estate’s adventure playground, the farmyard where my lifelong obsession with creatures great and small may have taken root, and the cascading water fountain where I used to play pirates (and where I once fell over and slashed my knee).
But it wasn’t just Chatsworth that changed my impression of my former home county. We also paid a visit to Bakewell’s farmers market, reputedly the second largest such market in the UK, with stalls crammed full of juicy pickles, fragrant cheeses and rich chocolate cake. And we spent time in Derby, whose charmingly quirky cobbled lanes and curious history (it’s reputedly the most haunted city in England, though I hear York is vying for the title) had faded from my memory.
I can’t pretend I’ll ever want to live in such a rural area again – I’ve always been a city girl at heart – but from now on whenever I go back to Derbyshire I’m going to make an effort to remove the blinkers and explore places which my teenage self had dismissed.
Of course, the adventure playground was still the highlight of my week – after all, we never really grow up do we?
