deers and dessert delights

Guess what we did today? Yep, you got it a underground ride to the train station, a train to a bus station in Stamford, and a bus to another stately home. Days are starting to get mixed and my mind is starting to diminish from all that I learn and do in one day. Here is one such beautiful home called Burghley House. You may recognize it from Da Vinci Code when the cardinal pulls up to the house to discuss business. You pull up to the huge lawns and see the gate below the home, but the best part is you see all these deer and think 'what the?'

The family owns their own heard of deer that have bred and bred for hundreds of years and continue to live on the grounds. I was so excited and followed those deer around, clearly they were afraid. What comes to my mind, I have pretzels in my bag and deers like pretzels! I walked on over, stuck out the pretzels and they came a running. It was so fun to have them be that tame and that close to all of us. I tried to film it but it came out only 2 seconds long. After my bag was gone, I walked in to the house for our tour only to discover I had become a victim. Hand bloody I ran to the bathroom and cleaned that right off. Hopefully the deer don't have diseases.

Our group split into two and headed into the home of the Earl of Exeter, the Lord of Burghley, the Cecil families home, the Burghley house. The home was first given to William Cecil who was the treasurer for Queen Elizabeth I. It's a major palace decorated in every square inch with beautiful gardens and incredible history.We first walked in to the kitchen which was about the size of two family rooms, just a huge space with two fireplaces that used to be run by little boys. The other side had huge copper platters above two bread fireplaces. Another cute little story is that back in the day eating turtle soup was a delicacy and since they didn't live near an ocean they had to have them shipped in warm sea water to the house. They had to quickly make the soup or it would turn hard incredibly fast. How cute is it that they even served it in these massive turtle shaped bowls? They knew how to party.

This family seems to be so modern, that may be due to the fact that they still live there. It contains a huge library, a billiard room, many bedrooms (around 80), and drawing rooms. Not for art drawing but where the royal woman would draw together in a single room for female time. My favorite room was the Heaven room which contained massive murals of roman gods and goddesses painted by the family friend. In the center of the room is a massive 290 lb. pure silver wine vat that looks somewhat like a bathtub on high legs. One of the bedrooms was set up for Queen Victoria and Albert when they stayed there. The bed could fit 10 people on it which was too large, and so they had to scale it down, and added more bling because the Queen loved bling. They also added turtle doves to the top because she was in love with her husband and produced 7 children. Everything about these houses is grand, and nothing is left undecorated. Oh to have that kind of wealth. It was gorgeous though. Also, Pride and Prejudice was filmed in parts of these rooms as well as Young Victoria. I get angry because I don't get to take pictures to show, but it was beautiful and gorgeous and everything you could want in a stately home.

Not to mention the gardens are sure beautiful with fountains, ponds, and flowers. Too bad it was raining so bad that we couldn't see them. We did however eat lunch at the cafe, scones and cream. Best thing I've eaten yet here! SO good. It was our own little tea party. We finished our visit to the house and headed to Stamford to hang out and shop for a little while. I was not so interested in wandering the streets as it was raining, I was tired, and completely shopped out by this point. Needless to say we headed on our long journey back home for the night and here we are, yet again, every night, doing homework, loving every second. Cheers!