The Great escape

This weekend, as many of you already know, I was working nights. Logically you might think that meant I had a whole lot of free time during the day but really I was mostly sleeping or eating or wishing I was doing one or the other. I wandered around in my pyjamas and drank many mugs of coffee, made jigsaws on my phone while watching back to back episodes of terrible cop shows and then I picked myself off the couch and headed to work again. Yesterday I wasted a beautiful day because I couldn't muster the energy to go out on my own and my boyfriend was at home recovering from a busy weekend of socialising so I stayed on the couch and pretended it wasn't sunny. I was determined that today would not be wasted. I crawled into bed just before 8 and whispered to Stephen (who had been keeping my bed company whilst I was up all night working) that he had better not wake me and set about trying to cram four nights sleep into a few hours. Luckily it sort of worked and I took in all of the sunshine today.

I woke at lunchtime feeling almost human and by two I was suitably caffeinated and ready to hit the road so we took a trip out to Mount Congreve. That's the great thing about Waterford is that when we get a bit of sun, there's so many lovely places nearby to get out and enjoy it. If you're not already familiar with it , Mount Congreve is a stately home just outside Waterford city with a vast landscaped woodland gardens. It used to be privately owned but it opened to the public in the last few years and it's a great spot to be on a sunny day. It opens Thursday to Sunday  and Bank Holidays (lucky for us) and it's €5 to get into the gardens. This helps with the upkeep of the gardens and its well worth it once you see what lies inside the walls. Once you arrive and park the car (it's too far out of town to walk to) you can head straight into the gardens and start exploring or you can buy plants for your own garden  in the onsite nursery, grab a cup of tea and slice of cake in the coffee shop or buy some lovely local made goods. They also have toilet facilities on the grounds, best to use them before you head into the gardens as there's seventy acres so it can be a bit of a maze when you get in.

I had my first visit to Mount Congreve last year so we didn't take a free map this time when paying in, I later thought perhaps we should have when we had trouble finding some of the spots we had liked so much on our previous visit. Last year when we came, it was beautiful but a lot of the plants weren't yet in bloom but today the gardens were awash with colour. It was a gorgeous day for a walk and it seemed that we weren't the only ones with the great idea of giving Mount Congreve a visit because the place was absolutely packed. It was great to see the place doing so well. We walked around for an hour and a half, meandering from one path to another and stopping to take photos every now and then. It's not a place to be if you're really indecisive because it feels like every few steps you have to decide which way to go and you can't help feeling that you could be missing something really great in the opposite direction. To really do the place justice, you would want to get there early and spend the day exploring, perhaps bring a picnic ( or head back to the lovely on site coffee shop for a bite to eat midway). We have promised to be back again soon to explore some more of the gardens that we have yet to see. It all goes to show that you don't have to go far when you live in the south east to have a great day out.