York to Milton Keynes by way of Nottingham

 June 3rd.    Cloudy day and not quite so warm as yesterday.

After breakfast at St Mary’s Guest House, watched over by the serving lady who reminded me of Fraulein Helga from Hogan’s Heroes, we carried our bags to the car and carefully negotiated the winding streets of central York heading in the direction of the M1.

Following signs to The South, London, we saw trucks, trucks and more trucks.   Some had signage in foreign languages, Polish and French being most common.   

No Cow Parsley alongside this road, instead there was a profusion of Marguerite Daisies.

Eventually we arrived safely at Wollaton Hall.   

This Elizabethan Mansion was built in the 1580s, by the same architect who designed Hardwick Hall.  It stands in around 500 acres of land most of which is a deer park.  

Currently it is calving season so we saw plenty of little Bambi running about at a safe distance from prying visitors.  The Hall itself is now a Natural History Museum and seemed to specifically target younger children.  There were school groups visiting while we were there.

However our interest was not in dinosaurs or skeletons of large fish but in the Willard Wigan Miniature Masterpieces exhibition.   

Upstairs in the gallery it was 20 microscopes set above these incredible miniature sculptures.   Willard Wigan is apparently described as Micro Angelo because of the sheer minuteness of his creations.   Most were set inside the eye of ordinary sewing needles, but one of the Taj Mahal was standing on the head of a dressmaking pin.   

Yet another was a mother Sumatran tiger looking at her cub and is mounted on a working automatic watch mechanism.   This was called Time For Change and was the first piece he designed for his Disappearing World Series.   

Once the noisy school group had gone we were able to enjoy the exhibits and the very well produced video of Wigan’s life story and his triumph over adversity.  

If you live within travelling distance I’d recommend a visit and if not then look at YouTube for a glimpse at his work.  It’s remarkable.

The cafe produced our worst cup of tea to date and an overly sweet muffin for me and a below par sausage roll for Little Sister.  We don’t recommend the eatery!   

Among the oak trees we saw one of my little squirrel friends but he wouldn’t play and I had no time to coax him.  We walked down a long avenue back to the car and then drove the M1 again to Milton Keynes.

Both of us are tired from the stress of driving in such busy traffic, hemmed in on all sides by lorries and vans and trucks of all sizes.  We saw two pilot vehicles, one labelled as such and the other labelled Abnormal Load.   But the worst sight was at the exit to Milton Keynes when we saw a Road Closed sign and both had visions of yet another unguided diversion.  Fortunately it was for the opposite direction or I suspect our tears may have raised the sea level of The Atlantic.

Tonight we are at a Holiday Inn so no stairs, full size bathroom and a restaurant on site.   We shall rest well for tomorrow’s adventure.