Witley Court and Gardens

Whilst deciding what days out to book for our Kidderminster holiday, I'd mostly concentrated on finding a National Trust property, as we are already members there, but for some reason none particularly struck a chord with me. Just on a whim, I looked at English Heritage, and liked the look of Witley Court. There aren't many English Heritage properties too close to our house, but with Tesco vouchers we were able to get the English Heritage membership for free, so I booked Witley Court.

As opposed to the half hour time slots for National Trust, English Heritage has hourly slots. This did mean there was a bit of a queue to get in when we arrived as it seemed a lot of people had arrived right at the beginning of the slot. We sat in the car and ate our picnic (because F is always ready for a car picnic and it saves us carrying so much food with us), and by the time we had finished, it was the middle of the slot and the queue had gone.

One thing we hadn't done since receiving our membership through the post was put the car sticker in the car. The car park at Witley Court is only free for members displaying a car sticker (£3 a day for non members) but after speaking to a staff member she told us not to worry.

Rather than ticking our names off on a list as at National Trust properties, Witley Court had us scan the QR code on our tickets. A member of staff manning the scanner told us that the toilets were one family group at a time, and we were to lock the main door behind ourselves, which seemed a sensible idea. She also gave us details of the tea rooms and fountain timings.

We picked up a summer quest booklet for F, but she lost interest reasonably quickly as most of it was a bit beyond her.

We followed the one way system through the woodland up to the house and garden. F was very pleased with the grassy areas she could run free on, and the ruin was very impressive. We were fortunate to catch the end of the fountain display which we all enjoyed.

After we'd had a good wander round, we walked down to the tea room, which I think was actually run by Witley Church. It was a lovely big garden, with plenty of spread out tables, which were all being cleaned regularly. The order point was outside, with the food then brought to your table. A good selection of sandwiches and cakes were on offer, and there were toilets available. The scones were lovely but could have done with some proper clotted cream.

The grounds were so spacious that it didn't feel crowded at all, and lots of families had taken picnics to eat in the gardens. I quite liked the approach to the toilets as it meant we definitely didn't cross paths with anyone on the way in/out, and seeing the tables being cleaned at the tea rooms was very reassuring.

https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/witley-court-and-gardens/




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