Outing | Music Rooms

Stepping into a room where a musician practised or composed can give you a new understanding of their work. Here are a few places around the UK where you can immerse yourself a bit and say ‘thank you for the music’.

1. Ralph Vaughan Williams at Leith Hill Place

In the Surrey Hills, just outside Dorking, sits Leith Hill Place, the childhood home of 20th-century composer, Vaughan Williams. You can see the piano on which he composed some of his works, and wander the beautiful surrounding woodlands with views over the North Downs. It’s suddenly easy to see how The Lark Ascending came to him as you look out from the highest viewing point for 50 miles around. Stirring stuff. 

2. Gustav Holst at the Victorian House, Cheltenham

Holst’s birthplace at 4, Pittville Terrace (now 4, Clarence Road) Cheltenham is a wonderful example of a Victorian home, with much to see and learn about the era, as well as about Holst himself and his life and family. The highlight though is obviously the piano upon which he composed ‘The Planets’.

3. George Friedrich Handel at 25 Brook Street, London (Handel Hendrix House)

Handel was the first owner of this Mayfair house in 1723 and remained here until his death. There are four fully restored rooms where you can see period instruments and learn more about Georgian London and there are regular Baroque performances to really up the atmosphere. And if you’re a true music fan you will definitely want to pop next door… 

4. Jimi Hendrix at 23 Brook Street, London

The top floors of 23 Brook Street were home to Jimi and his girlfriend Kathy between 1968 abd 1969. On learning about his former next door neighbour, Jimi went out and bought Handel’s Messiah and Water Music from a record shop on South Molton Street. Entry is included with a ticket to Handel Hendrix House. 

5. John Lennon and Paul McCartney at 20 Forthlin Road and 251 Menlove Avenue, Liverpool

Another two-for-one tour that is sure to delight music fans. The National Trust does a private tour of Paul McCartney’s childhood home, a 1950s council terrace on Forthlin Road, followed by a nose around 251 Menlove Avenue where John Lennon lived with his Aunt Mimi and her husband George. Certain to Please, Please You if you’re a Beatles follower. 

This blog was inspired by the ‘My Place’ feature in our March issue, which this month looks at music rooms, including the one pictured above, which belongs to Meaghan Keating @the.narrows.project. 

Buy this month's The Simple Things - buy, download or subscribe

More music appreciation…

More from our March issue…

Outings | Days out for You and Your Dog

Fancy a grand day out with your four-legged friend? Here are a few ideas that go beyond a simple ‘walkies’.

Park

Dogs that love to run but don’t have great recall will thrive in Wrenbury Hall’s enclosed woodland in Nantwich, Cheshire. Totally secure with fencing around 1.5 metres high, it’s a totally safe space to let your dog off-lead to explore on its own. unleashedwrenbury.co.uk

Cinema

Ducie Street Warehouse in Manchester is a brilliant dog-friendly dining and drinking space with its own pet-friendly cinema. Check the run-times to find out which screenings are letting dogs in, pick up your popcorn and head in to enjoy a dog-friendly film on the big screen. duciestreet.com. Curzon cinemas in London, Canterbury, Knutsford and Sheffield also run Dog Day Afternoons, where you can bring your pet. The volume is lower, and there are also treats for dogs (and people). curzon.com

Café

There are dog-friendly cafés, and then there’s Love My Human Townhouse in London. Less dog-friendly and more dog-first, this pet-obsessed café is built for dogs. Anything goes here, with dogs encouraged to sit at the tables and on sofas, plus a full dog menu, because surely your pet deserves a brunch of scrambled eggs or a hearty lunch of beef Wellington with pumpkin purée? lovemyhuman.co.uk

Sport

Dog Masters Festival, in Bournemouth, is all about four-legged surfers. The UK dog surfing championships is held every July on Branksome Dene Beach, a soft, yellow-sand stretch, and features live music, street food and, of course, surfing dogs. shakasurf.co.uk

Festival

If you can imagine Glastonbury, but instead of bands, it’s dog experts, and instead of people, it’s dogs, then you’re picturing DogFest, the UK’s biggest and most chaotic dog-friendly festival, held at various stately homes around the UK. This two-day extravaganza, features fun dog shows, an obedience ring, expert speakers and fun dog displays, plus interactive activities such as hay-bale racing and agility, and is a riot for humans and dogs alike. dogfest.co.uk

These ideas are taken from Dog Days Out: 365 Things To Do With Your Dog In The UK And Ireland by Lottie Gross (Conway). You can read a longer extract in our September issue.

Buy this month's The Simple Things - buy, download or subscribe

More blogs about dogs…

More from our blog…

How To | Have a Secret Day Off

A day off just to yourself is the best secret. Disappear for a day, Agatha Christie style, and recharge your batteries. Here’s how…

Book a day off, pack up a lunch, turn off your phone, and disappear somewhere nobody knows you! (It’s a good plan to leave a secret envelope and alert a loved one to your vanishing just in case but otherwise, jump on a bus or train and enjoy nobody knowing where you are for a few hours. 

Before you book trains or make plans though, decide what you want from the day. We’ve come up with a few ideas to get you going. 

In need of a bit of culture?

Head to a city with a gallery or museum you’ve never been to. If you’re in the north, Edinburgh, Oxford, York and Glasgow are good options for cities with galleries and plenty of culture. Brighton, Bristol and St Ives are good if you’re a touch further south, 

For a quirky museum, try the dog collar museum in Leeds, the pencil museum in Keswick, or the Flea Collection (viewable only through a microscope)at Tring Natural History Museum. 

In search of adventure?

Climb a hill! Pen Y Fan in the Brecon Beacons is a nice easy hill to climb if you’re a beginner. Yes Tor in Dartmoor or Cat Bells in the Lake District are also good choices for a ‘do in a day’ mountain hike. Just pack plenty of water, snacks, warm and waterproof layers and maps. And this is one to disclose to a loved one, maybe. You don’t want Mountain Rescue being called out for nothing. 

Fancy lunch alone?

Pop a good book in your bag, do some menu perusing and find an eatery where you can relax alone over several courses, not feel silly and - crucially - not have to make pointless small talk. Here are a few ideas that are perfect for a date with me, myself and I:

Asian restaurants where the kitchen is on view give you plenty to look at without feeling silly for being alone. From Wagamamas to Shoryu Ramen, Japanese street food was made for eating alone. If you don’t fancy watching the chefs at work, why not go for a restaurant with a view. Anywhere on the water is a good bet - there the scenery is always changing. We like Hix Oyster and Fish House at Lyme Regis, or the River Exe Cafe in Devon, but you might find the most humble of pizzerias or cafes on the banks of a river anywhere. 

Do a secret event 

It might be a non-league football match (or even a big league team you’ve followed). Or how about seeing a favourite band in concert, a premier for a film or exhibition or the recording of a TV show you love? Or even the opening of the Chelsea Flower Show? Whatever it is you fancy doing, do your research and then book your day off around it. Bonus points if you appear on the big screen in your sunglasses and hat disguise!

Hide in nature for a day

Drive or take a train to a wood or planned walk with amazing views. Visit a beach with great sunsets with a Thermos of soup. Or simply find a path through fields that will allow you a pleasant walk, plenty of fresh air and lots of peace and birdsong. Try The ORdnance Survey’s Get Outside app https://getoutside.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/app/ for more ideas and to plan a walk. 

Looking for nostalgia?

Why not visit somewhere you’ve been before? It might be your home town if you’ve since moved away (and can rely on your playgroup teacher not spotting you and squeezing your cheeks) or it could be the location of a childhood holiday or a first holiday with a new partner. There’s nothing quite like the thrill of turning each corner and saying to yourself “Oh! That’s just how I remember it!”

Feeling spontaneous?

There’s lots of fun to be had in simply sticking a pin in a map or a train route planner and Just Going. You could make it fun by picking a page number of the A-Z and just going there, or deciding to visit somewhere with a rude name, or a castle or a beach that you’ve never been to. The best part is never telling anyone you went there. 

We were inspired to plan a Secret Day Off by our feature How Hard Can It Be to take a Secret Day Off in our September issue.  Buy this month's The Simple Things - buy, download or subscribe

More from our September issue…

More outings to get excited about…

Fun facts | British Motorways

Surprise and delight your fellow passengers with these fast motorway facts

We’re all so excited to be planning and enjoying a few jaunts further afield now. In celebration of that we’ve put together a Pocket Guide to Pit Stops of places to stop, eat and enjoy just off the motorway around Britain. You can find it in the April issue with instructions on how to cut it out and fold it into your very own pocket guide to pop in your glove box. 

While you wait for your copy to arrive so you can plan your next sojourn, we’ve put together a few fascinating* facts about British motorways for you to share with your fellow passengers on the journey. Strap in! This could be a bumpy ride!

* The Simple Things can take no responsibility for what you or the next woman considers to be fascinating. We’ve led a sheltered life for the last year. 

• The first full-length motorway was the M1 but if we’re splitting hairs the first ‘stretch’ of motorway was in fact the Preston Bypass (now part of the M6), which was opened by Harol Macmillan in 1958. It was just eight and a quarter miles long. 

• The first motorway service station, meanwhile was Watford Gap, built on the M1 just a year after it opened. 

• Britain’s widest stretch of motorway is 17 lanes wide (both sides of the carriageway) and is found on the M61 at Linnyshaw Moss in Greater Manchester where the motorway meets the M60 and the A580. 

• The most haunted motorway in Britain is the M6, with sightings of Roman soldiers and a woman screaming at the side of the road. (Perhaps she’d seen the price of the service station coffee). 

• The longest motorway in Britain is the M6 (236 miles long), which runs from Catthorpe in Leicestershire up to the Scottish border, while the shortest is thought to be the A635M in Manchester at just under half a mile. 

• Rumours tell that there are dead bodies from gangland killings hidden in the concrete and cement that was used to make the M25. 

• On a more pleasant note, the M25 is also the only motorway we know of that has a cricket pitch on it. Well, ok, above it. There’s a cricket square on the Bell Common tunnel which the M25 passes under between Junctions 26 and 27. 

• The M1 has no junction 3. When it was built they planned to add in Junction 3 at a later date once the link road to the A1 was built. But the link road was cancelled so the junction was never built and a service station now sits where it would have been. 

• When the M25 first opened it had no speed restrictions. We assume they foresaw a time when speed restrictions on Britain’s busiest motorway would be pointless since it was at a standstill much of the time anyway.
  

  Buy this month's The Simple Things - buy, download or subscribe

More from our May issue…

More fun for the journey…

Recipe | Hot Smoked Salmon, Caper and Dill Tart

A simple tart that will have everyone reaching across the picnic blanket for the biggest slice

A tasty and filling savoury tart that is ideal as the centrepiece of a spring picnic or a light lunch in the garden with friends. Serve with a big green salad or just cram it in with fingers and have cherry tomatoes on the side. Tastes as good sitting on the car boot with a view of the sea as it does out on the patio.

Serves 8

375g shortcrust pastry
2 tbsp olive oil
1 small onion, peeled and finely chopped
180g ready-to-eat hot smoked salmon
35g capers, drained and rinsed
3 eggs 150ml single cream
50ml milk
15g fresh dill, fronds picked

1 On a lightly -floured surface, roll out the pastry and use it to line a 35cm x 13cm flan tin (alternatively, you can use a 26cm circular flan tin). Trim any overhanging pastry and prick the base with a fork. Chill in the fridge for 20 mins. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 200C/Fan 180C/Gas 6.
2 Once chilled, remove from the fridge, line with foil and fill with baking beans. Bake for 10 mins, remove the foil and beans and bake for a further 10-12 mins, or until the pastry is crisp. Set aside to cool.
3 Heat the oil in a pan and gently fry the onion for 5 mins, or until soft and golden. Spread over the pastry base, then flake over the salmon and capers.
4 In a bowl , beat the eggs, cream and milk together, then stir in the dill and season to taste. Pour into the pastry case and bake for 35-40 mins, or until firm and golden. Leave to cool before slicing into portions.

This recipe is just one of the picnic ideas by Louise Gorrod in our feature A Vintage Day Out. You can find all the recipes, including Rainbow Chard and Feta Borek, Herby Hoummous, Strawberry and Mint Shrub, Summer Wraps and more beginning on page 54.

Buy this month's The Simple Things - buy, download or subscribe

From our May issue…

More picnic recipes…