There’s a school of thought that when a great gardener has made a garden it should be preserved forever, whatever the merits of the garden. Lord Cavendish at Holker Hall inherited a garden, which had been commissioned by his grandmother from Thomas Mawson, one of the undoubted greats. Unfortunately Lord Cavendish thought it was “perfectly horrible”. He wasn’t alone. The moment of truth came when he and his wife were working in the garden one summer’s day and a member of the public asked politely; “Can you please direct us to the gardens?” He tore it out, to howls of protest from garden historians, but to the great relief of the visiting public.
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Brockhole, on the shores of Lake Windermere, is another Mawson garden. I think the words “perfectly horrible” describe it perfectly. It’s difficult to see how much of the original is left, and I don’t think it would be fair to ascribe any of its present defects to faults in Mawson’s original design. Apparently, 100 years ago it was one of the finest gardens in the Lakes. But it’s sadly neglected now, as the photo below shows. 

Written about 1,000 years ago, ‘Sakuteiki, Visions of The Japanese Garden’ is the oldest known book on garden design. It begins with the phrase “ishi wo taten koto” which is translated as “when creating a garden”, but means, literally “when setting stones upright”, because in those days the correct placement of stones was at the heart of garden design. Some of the book is about aesthetics, such as how to make the most of a borrowed landscape, but much of it is about how to placate the Gods, or at least how to avoid annoying them too much. ​

The redcurrants shone so brightly in the sunshine that you could see them from over the bay and yet the birds didn’t seem to bother much with them. Half of our redcurrant bushes are in the open, with no netting to protect them, and there were some signs, from feathers and droppings, that the birds had been there, but the losses were minimal. I think the ants got more, and there was some mould damage because of the rain. But today we harvested 50 lbs (about 22 kilos) of almost perfect berries, which is as good a day’s work as we are likely to achieve. We can enjoy those summer puddings with a clear conscience.

Gore Vidal famously said: “Every time a friend succeeds, I die a little”. He’s also attributed with the corollary “It’s not enough to succeed, others must fail”. He’s right, there’s nothing more enjoyable than seeing someone fall flat on their face, particularly if they’re in the same business as you.
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This week there has been a spectacular fall, in the drubbing received by Forman’s restaurant from the press and their customers because of their disastrous decision to charge £75 for breakfast*.

By rights blueberries shouldn’t thrive in my garden, and they didn’t use to. Blueberries need acid soil and ours, on limestone rock, is neutral at best. I have two blueberry bushes and they were very feeble, hardly managing to produce any fruit at all. So I dug them up, removed all the soil and replanted the bushes in ericaceous soil. They have responded magnificently. Blueberries are unusual in that they produce their fruit gradually, with ripe berries on the same branch as immature ones. ​

There’s a foodie triangle in the Lyth Valley with six of the best places to eat in Cumbria. First there’s The Punch Bowl Inn in Crosthwaite which is in the Good Food Guide and the Michelin Pub guide. Then there’s The Mason’s Arms at Strawberry Bank, a Camra favourite, which is Pub of the Year 2012. Not forgetting my own Damson Dene Hotel at Crosthwaite, which receives a steady stream of five star reviews from Tripadvisor and has their Certificate of Excellence. Two more pubs and a restaurant, The Hare and Hounds at Bowland Bridge, The Brown Horse Inn at Winster and the Lyth Valley restaurant, are among the best in the county.

The Lyth Valley road used to be the main route to Windermere but it’s now a quiet backwater with a jumble of lanes leading off it, down which many of these places are to be found.