Manor Houses: Waddesdon and Hughenden

Last Friday, I had the day off - so of course I gallivanted. We visited Waddesdon Manor and Hughenden Manor. Waddesdon Manor is one of the Rothschild's residences. It was really pretty - the grounds were quite extensive and it was a beautiful day. Hughenden Manor was the residence of Benjamin Disraeli who was prime minister during the reign of Queen Victoria. During the Second World War, this house was high on the "hit list" of Hitler due to its use as the headquarters for making the maps used in air bombing runs for the RAF over Germany.

This is the small flower bed at the beginning of the front lawn. If the urn in the flower bed is this large, you know the house is going to be enormous!

Waddesdon Manor - the house. It is a renaissance style French Chateau. Too bad the shingles need cleaning - they can be a brilliant blue.

The parterre in the back garden. Fancy-shmancy! This fountain is directly behind the dining room windows that also open out onto the terrace. Can you imagine if this was part of your dining room?

The flowers on the parterre. There are over 14,000 begonias in this flower bed. I cannot imagine having to weed here! During the house's heyday, the gardeners would completely change out the flowers in this garden every night so that the visiting guests would have a new view each day when they came down for breakfast. Now that's wealth.

A view from the back. So fairy-tale-esque!

Robin topiary near the aviary. Very neat.

Hughenden Manor - I really liked the quiet secludedness of this place. The house is set back in some trees behind an old Parish church.

A view from the back garden. Some people were playing croquet. Looks fun!