Halloween

We have had the most beautiful autumn. September and October have been warm, sunny, simply delightful. For most of the last 2 months, preparations have been underway for one big event -- Halloween at Blickling.

Halloween falls on the last open weekend for the House -- the gardens continue to be open 4 days a week all year around, but the house closes to the public for most of the winter. Just at the point you would expect everyone to be winding down, or at least preparing for the big winter clean, the focus is on getting ready for a big party with 600 paying guests. Outside the entrance, a 22 foot wide bat; inside, a huge spider with glowing red eyes sits across the staircase in the Great Hall. Monks in black habits jump out from dark corners, a gory 2nd Earl (who died after losing a duel) moans and complains about his injuries, two witches in a cavern stir their cauldron, line dancing skeletons encourage visitors to join in to music provided by a group of drummers in costume.

Having finished the tour of the house, visitors then go to hear a ghost story -- actually a very educational tale of Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII and the torture and execution preferences of Tudor England. Anne's ghostly connection with Blickling is emphasized, of course, but some of the adults felt there was too much gruesome detail. The children didn't complain. I got to play the Good Fairy, helping children make a wish after the story was finished. None of them looked traumatized, unless it was my purple wig and wings upsetting them.

In the gardens, the floodlights were coloured to give an eery glow and the mist rose from the lake forming the perfect spooky atmosphere. The child catcher was out with his net, a spider descended on the unwary as they walked past the yew hedge, and two vampires took it in turns to jump out of a coffin. One person fell over trying to get away, but we didn't complete an accident form. Shrieks and laughter could be heard all over the gardens.

The best thing about this event was seeing the whole house being used, not just static displays of stuff, but the space being occupied by staff and volunteers enjoying themselves with the visitors. Breaking away from the habit of showing the house in a formal and rigid fashion will take more work, but Halloween has shown me it can be done.

Water leaks and damp squibs

The water main at Blickling is a testament to ingenuity: that of the generations of engineers and plumbers who have built it, extended it, added pipework in a variety of different materials, and above all failed to leave any reliable records of where it goes and where the stopcocks are.

I met a tenant farmer who told me that his family have been farming on the estate here for 300 years. Seven generations have worked the land, passing their knowledge of the seasons, the crops, the animals one to another. But they must have forgotten about the water pipes because a week after I met him, this same farmer managed to spike the water main that passes through his field, thus cutting off supplies to a dozen or so houses and farms. Our building surveyor was soon on the scene, just in time to watch the same farmer spike the same pipe in a neighbouring field! Water was gushing out, washing away all the topsoil, demonstrating the soil loss -- the pipe was less than a metre deep in the middle of the field, but two metres deep at the margins. This is typical, I'm told, of the soil erosion that occurs in Norfolk.

After several hours' work, the householders and farmers were reconnected, but this underlines the fragility of the infrastructure which we all rely upon. A week or so later, another leak appeared outside the Hall, probably a mile from the field of the first leak, but undoubtedly related. A section of the damaged pipe was brought to me (I get to see all sorts of stuff) -- the rusted Victorian cast iron pipe was barely a millimetre thick and the impact of turning the water off and on again had caused a crack. Because the leak was close to the house, we were concerned it might damage the foundations, or the moat bridge, or even the yew hedge above it. The engineers were fantastic and discovered more stopcocks in the garden that had been carefully covered with lawn by previous generations of gardeners. So we didn't have to disconnect everyone on the property and we saved the yew hedge. Everyone was happy. Next year we have decided we must begin to replace this ancient water main -- or at least get it properly mapped.

So what about the damp squib? Well, we were meant to be having a royal visit. The King and Queen of Malaysia were visiting Lotus cars south of Norwich, and we were told that the Queen wanted to visit Blickling for a tour of the house and garden and afternoon tea. She would have a retinue of 20 people, and a press corps of 10. And she was bringing her own butler to serve her tea. So on a chilly Friday afternoon, we were all ready to receive the royal party, with tea laid on in the house, a seating plan prepared, various staff on hand to receive the guests and give them guided tours.

Then a series of phone calls. First, the Queen has her two youngest children with her, and they aren't on the seating plan. Then, the press corps won't be coming as they have to file their stories. Then -- no Queen! But we will be receiving a group of 5 ladies -- one director of Lotus and 4 of her colleagues' wives! They were charming and seemed to enjoy their special tour and a rather huge afternoon tea -- but no butler.

But the following day, the local newspaper proudly reported that the Queen of Malaysia had enjoyed her visit to Blickling Hall. Perhaps she was incognito.