Marilyn Stowe Blog

Harrogate in Spring

It’s spring! Yes: springtime has come to the North of England. Across the 200 acres of open parkland, laid out in the 18^th century and known as the Harrogate Stray, spring flowers are coming into bloom. How cheery they have started to look and how cheerful it makes you feel, driving up the hill into Harrogate with the park and the pretty flowers on either side.

At lunchtime yesterday, I couldn’t resist: the sun was shining and I went for a walk along the Stray. I walked past the Tewit Well where, in 1571, the first mineral water was discovered by William Slingsby. The well is still there, covered by a dome. I walked all around the Stray. It is fabulous: it stretches through the entire town and although Harrogate is a thriving commercial centre, it certainly doesn’t feel like one. We have the best of both worlds. It is good to work in such a beautiful place and equally good to exercise and then relax.

On my return I popped into Hotel Chocolat and bought some irresistible chocolate Easter eggs. Heaven! After the office closed, some of us went to watch our very own Morna Rose, Practice Manager and Tina Davis, Credit Control Manager, who are both appearing at the Harrogate Theatre in Fiddler on the Roof. Dinner followed at a delicious little Italian restaurant called Sasso in the nearby square, and then home to bed.

We are entering the Harrogate in Bloom competition again this year, and our office is already looking very pretty.

Harrogate has always been gorgeous. My granny used to tell me how she and her grandmother used to visit Harrogate to “take the waters” in Edwardian times, before the First World War. Harrogate was in its heyday then. There was the Winter Garden, modelled on Crystal Palace, with its bands playing and fabulous gardens in which to stroll. There was the Royal Hall where there were tea dances and concerts during the day, and evening gala dinners and burlesque in the evenings. (The Royal Hall still stands.) Visitors would retire to grand hotels after a hydrotherapy treatment in the Royal Baths or drinking mineral water in the Pump Room, by “omnibus, or carriage”. It was all very grand, attracting members of the Royal Family, foreign royalty and luminaries such as Charles Dickens and also Agatha Christie, who stayed incognito in the Old Swan Hotel.

To a young girl like my granny, it must have been awe-inspiring. Our Stowe Family Law building used to be the courthouse here, and was built in 1897. I wonder if she walked past it? She couldn’t have imagined that her granddaughter would be there 100 years later, could she?

I would like to wish all readers a very good spring break. I also hope that being able to get out and enjoy this pretty time of year will help cheer some of those who have been having hard times.

Image credit: Lesley Beever.