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Off we go!
Braodway, Not in NY
And still more after that
The River Nene at the city center, with swansThorpe hall - Cromwellian pile.
I was very nearly born here, but was switched at the last moment to a place up the road.
I the place should have become the main site for Peterborough Museum, after part of the grounds was sold for office development. It never happened, the council just trousered the money.
The place was eventually sold to the Sue Ryder foundation who run the place as a hospice. You can however visit the grounds, which are impressive and by arrangement some of the ground floor rooms.
Thorpe Hall itself is an example of a Cromwellian mansion - the only one in the United Kingdom still standing in its own grounds. It was built for Oliver St John, a member of Oliver Cromwell's Lord Chief Justice, in 1652. There is impressive wood carving in the Chapel, a the Great Hall and intimate Parlour.
The look of the place is somewhat unusual as the architect was ordered to borrow from the Dutch and Italian architectural traditions - and he thus came up with something quite unique.
The Garden centre, shops and on Sunday minature railway can all be visited.
I find I have quite a special connection to this place as various member of my family have been born, married or departed within its walls over the last 40 years or so.
