We woke to a beautiful, bright and sunny morning, it was bitterly cold due to the overnight frost and -2c temperature. Such a contrast to the past three weeks when we were waking up to persistent rain every day. After an early morning walk with Meg and Gracie and both dogs fed, watered and comfortably asleep on their settees, we headed over to Pocklington to have a walk around the gardens at Burnby Hall.

It was just after 10.15am as we entered the ticket office, and after exchanging pleasantries with the admission staff we headed outside and made our way to the edge of the upper lake. I cannot believe it was last September since our last visit, where has that time gone?

One of the reasons for visiting this morning was that they have a huge collection of over 120 named varieties of Snowdrops which are all currently in flower. After leaving the warmth of the ticket office, we headed over to the edge of the upper lake, I was pleasantly surprised at the huge number of freshwater fish that came up to the surface for food, usually at this time of year the fish would be at the bottom of the pond, ours certainly are. Leaving the water’s edge, we followed the path around the lake in a anti clockwise direction, passing the large white dovecote on our right, several white doves were sat outside their nest holes enjoying the early morning sunshine. We followed the footpath along the ‘Birch Walk’, which had been established back in 2019. The deep borders were full of winter flowering plants, including huge clusters of Snowdrops and pink flowering Cyclamen interspaced with cream-coloured Hellebores and purple flowering miniature Iris.  The white bark of the Birch trees looked stunning and gave some depth and form to the colourful borders. We continued our walk along the ‘Birch Walk’ till we reached ‘Jamie’s Bridge’ always a popular spot for a photo opportunity especially looking over the lake towards the heathers amongst the ‘Rock Garden’. Continuing our walk around the lake we headed down the slope and up through the wooden gate into the ‘Stumpery’. Pockets of Snowdrops were in full flower amongst the ferns and huge tree stumps, lilac coloured Cyclamen added additional colour to the area. Pockets of emerging miniature daffodils will soon be coming into flower. Leaving the ‘Stumpery’ we headed to the water’s edge before walking through the ‘Rock Garden’. This part of the lake still had a light covering of ice on its surface, being quite sheltered by the surrounding trees, and the sun not quite reaching this part of the garden till mid-morning. Despite the cool winter weather, the rockery was looking an absolute picture, with Heathers, Snowdrops, Cyclamen, Hellebores and Iris in full flower along with many other alpines whose names just slip my memory, adding splashes of colour amongst the weathered rocks. After leaving the rock garden we headed into the ‘Walled Garden’, created in 2022. Always looking immaculate with manicured lawns and clean and tidy borders, wild grasses swayed gently in the morning breeze, pockets of flowering Crocus and miniature Iris, along with large areas of Snowdrops added lots of colours to the garden. From the Walled garden  we walked past the aviary on our right before heading into the warmth of the ‘Lilypad Café’ for a mid-morning brunch.