We thought Bury St. Edmunds was such a quaint town that we decided to delay our departure to visit Lavenham and Beth Chatto’s garden to give us more time to explore the beautiful Abbey Gardens and cathedral and the town centre, which had a market in progress with lots of fruit and vegetable stalls.
By mid-morning, we had explored the town enough and set off to check out the wool town of Lavenham, with its superb 15th century timber framed buildings, including the town’s magnificent Guildhall Building.
As it turned out, there was a celebration of 1940s war-time England happening in the town with many residents turning out dressed in the fashion of the time plus U.S. army officers and British military figures as well as cars, trucks and jeeps from that period. Harry Potter fans were delighted as scenes from the Deathly Hallows movies were filmed there.
After lunch, we went to Colchester to visit Beth Chatto’s celebrated garden, which turned out to be much bigger than expected with a grand lake setting and large sweeping shrub and perennial borders and lovely, relaxing woodland walks.
But we were all thrilled to explore what Beth Chatto had become most famous for – her large gravel garden featuring many drought resistant plants as well as ones that can survive with minimal watering.
We made notes and took lots of pictures of favourite plants, including some we have had a hard time finding in Vancouver.
Back in Bury St. Edmunds, we had a fun pub night at the Mason’s Arms. Others went to the tiny Victorian pub, The Nutshell, with its quirky features including a mummified cat.
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