The quest to see 30 National trust properties to complete the “Pink Passport” continued with what was stamp number 18 –Fountains Abbey
This was a place I have been meaning to visit for many years as I am a big fan of gothic type architecture, but I had just never gotten around to it.
When I finally set myself a date to see it, I set off bright and early as it was quite a distance to travel and for some reason the Sat Nav seemed to not be able to work out where the place was and kept sending me round the same (wrong) loop ending up back at the same place, but luckily for me, I was reasonably close to the site and was able to follow the road signs and reached the site in the end.
Overall I was very impressed with the site, the visitor centre which guides you through the history of the site in manageable chunks is well done and serves as a great introduction.
There was more to the site than I initially thought with Studley Royal Water gardens, a watermill and also an old manor house all available to see (so much so I ran out of time without seeing the Water Gardens).
The weather was very changeable with strong sunshine giving way to sharp showers throughout the day, but it did not put a dampener on the day and it is now one of my favourite sites and one I hope to get back to soon.
