Virginia Woolfe said Knole looked like an entire village. She set "Orlando" here, a fable about Vita. This is the ancestral home of the Sackville-Wests--for roughly 400 years. It was built by an Archbishop of Canterbury...or started, shall we say. It has 365 rooms, 52 staircases, 12 courtyards...well, you get the picture. Vita grew up here. Hers is the only soul I know in literature that became one with a place. Just like me. And Scarlett O'Hara. Knole lived in ...

Monday I was up early and on the ferry. I picked up a rental car and sped from Southampton to Kent, "The Garden of England." Highways, I love. One lane roads with two-way traffic and ZERO birm I can do without. I got an automatic, because I knew I would never manage to follow directions, drive on the left, and shift with my left hand at the same time. All went well. I stopped at Winkworth Arboretum, outside Guildford, and joined the National Trust. Many of the ...

Our best friends make us better. Have you noticed? I can't be petty around Ash. Any adversity that comes her way, she says it helps define what's important. Lots of stuff has happened over the years. Lots of it is good stuff. Some of it is rotten. Well. In my opinion. Not in Ashley's. If you're a Brit, then you should know that my American girlhood friend is one of your national spokespeople for Motor Neurone Disease (ALS back home). Last year she was featured a...

Magic happens. I ended up at Mount House because that's where the path went, I can't take any credit for it whatsoever. Next to seeing loved ones, it's the Most Important Thing To Happen in a long time. B&B is a misnomer. You walk through a blue gate into a garden that is simply running rampant with bloom. Nonchalant in its beauty, uncontrived, stunning. And you think, well, aren't I lucky? It gets better. It's a large red brick home, rimmed in garden. You ...

I love everything about Ashley's home--location-weather-water-water-water. Have I mentioned she went to high school in Portsmouth, Virginia--to which Gosport,, VA is a suburb? And now she lives in Gosport, Hampshire--which is a suburb of Portsmouth, UK. To get to Ashley's from Portsmouth you take a 5-minute ferry ride from Portsmouth. It was absolutely stunning! Such a day we had! We were going to see Rhys' band do a charity gig, but Ash took me out early and w...