Lavender + Flax fields, Strawberry picking, Hay Stack & Hartland Quay cliffs

event :: Lavender field, flax field, strawberry picking, hay stacks and Hartland Quay
date :: 2nd + 3rd July 2011
location :: Snowshill, Somerset, Hailes Abbey, Hartland, UK
theme :: red + blue.

[1] This is our 2nd year (and 3rd time!) of lavender field photo shoot. Even though we had our fill of photos here last year (1st time here and 2nd time here), but we weren’t in a bit satisfied. Tbh, we would have loved to make it a yearly routine. The seemingly endless bright purple field was simply breathtaking! (plus hubbykun wanted to take some video, we didn't make one on our last visit). hubbykun and i kept saying that it was a waste that we missed all these flower fields during our first year here. We weren’t aware about these kinda attractions before and mostly do city sightseeing. English town are certainly charming, but somehow countryside has a more special place to us ;)




[2] Kidnapping the super-cute Hawa to pose with us on the planet lavender! While we were waiting for hubbykun to complete his tripod setting, I shared my ipod speaker with Hawa. I’m not sure if this was the first time she had a speaker in ear, but she seemed really enthralled with the music and insisted on having both of the earpiece. hehe.




[3] According to the official website, they started harvesting the field on 14th July and it took about a week to complete harvesting. Due to the short time window, be sure to properly mark  your calendar. Hubbykun even emailed them in advance just to be sure. Unfortunately, there were no sunflowers this year like what they had last year. They said that the summer this year is a bit dry so sunflower seeds didn't make it :(  that gave us more time to try out different poses on the lavender field though. One of our favourite one is the piggyback ride!




[4] A portrait picture of kak kin and family. I think this would be the first time they have been to Snowshill lavender, although this was not their first lavender trip. Last year, we met Kak Kin/Leen/Kak Wan/Kak Faezah/Kak Mahani/Rozi & their respective families by accident when were at Somerset lavender. Coincidentally, it was Kak Wan’s birthday that day that we ended up crashing at the birthday party they planned for her in Chew Valley Lake :P




[5] This time around, the crowd was smaller than last year and Kak Kin was the only one from the same party seeing that the rest of them have gone back to Malaysia. wah so jealous! In the beginning we didn’t really plan that this trip will be a coordinated one, it was kinda a last minute plan. Kak Anis + family also decided to join us. Despite the small crowd, we have a great fun because everyone was such a sport and do not mind following Director hubbykun’s instructions proven by this free-style running pose ;)




[6] Besides that, hubbykun also ask the girls (from all range of ages? :P) to do this pose. Not really sure what to call it, so I’m naming it crooked airplane pose? :P We asked Ayiq to join us but he didn’t want to cause he was very wary of the teeny bees buzzing around the flowers.




[7] Luckily Suffian, Kak Anis’s youngest who is the same age of Ayiq (I think) was there too. Upon getting some assurance and motivational words from Suffian, Ayiq was willing to come a little closer to the lavender albeit a lot reluctantly hehe.




[8] Actually, the first ones to arrive at Snowshill was us and Farah/Imran who were bandwagon with us on the car we hired. Because the rest of the gang haven’t arrived yet, hubbykun drive around a little bit to check out the wheat field that we saw somewhere near the lavender field last year.




[9] We were very surprised to find that this year, the area was planted with flax field (linseed oil) instead. The flax field looked much more in bloom than the one we came across during our poppy fields hunting back in May. Because of this, the light blue carpet looked much more beautiful and we were sighing in amazement!




[10] The next to arrive a few minutes later than us was the ever punctual Khairi/Unic/Hawa + Pn. Maznah. Believe it or not we left the house at 7.30 am in the morning and arrived in Snowhill at around 9.15 am. The lavender farm would only opened at 10am so we have plenty of time to kill photographing here instead.




[11] Really love this back hooray shot of unic/khairi/hawa. So cute. Must remember to have one shot like this in the future too!




[12] A solo shot of Unic, the pregnant mother who has born a beautiful baby boy recently in Ramadhan. Doesn’t she looked glowing with happiness? ;)




[13] Another favourite photoshop trick that hubbykun REALLY adores, the ‘little earth’. Perhaps due to the lack of the creative bone in me that I simply do not know how to appreciate it though :P




[14] Kak Kin arrived the last because Abg Zahar was catching up on some sleep due to his late night shift work. While waiting for them to arrive, everyone has had enough of lavender and decided to hang out the the lavender cafe. While waiting for them to arrive, we started walloping Kak Odah’s yummylicious mini pizza bread. wow I’m forever amazed with the culinary skills of the ladies here!




[15] From Snowshill Lavender, we made our way to the PYO (pick your own) Hayles fruit farm just a few miles from here. In our earlier plan, we wanted to check out the Primrose Vale farm. But on the night before we left home, hubbykun checked out their website and there was an announcement that they were low on strawberry due to the heavy visitors coming from London for Wimbledon games. Hubbykun went through the list of other PYOs in South West and picked this one which was closest to Snowshill.




[16] Just to be safe, we called the farm before going to check out if there were strawberries for picking and was relieved to be informed that there were plenty available. True to its claim, the strawberries here are indeed ripe and huge in size!




[17] Everyone had their fill of self-picked strawberries. It cost around £3/kg, which was around the same price as what you would get at supermarkets, but of course we were here for the experience and the fun of picking.




[18] Unfortunately, our trip here was marred by the fact that the one of the farm’s employee manning the cash register extremely rude attitude. We read online here that there was a picnic area available and decided to have picnic here rather than at the picnic tables available at Somerset lavender. Our packed lunch that day consisted of some grilled popia made by us, kak anis + farah + unic who coincidentally all brought fried noodles, kak kin’s mac & cheese, and kak odah’s  ‘nasi lemak’. After picking, the kids got a treat of ice cream from generous Uncle Shahril ;)




[19] The area where we had our ‘controversial picnic’. The employee told us very rudely, saying snide remarks and in a loud voice that picnic is not allowed here, to the point of some people inside the tea room came outside to see what was going on. We were very upset about this and it really ruined the day. Hubbykun emailed them a complaint, but they never got a reply from them. Remind us not to come here EVER again... huhu




[20] On Sunday, hubbykun and I spent some together time just the two of us on a bit more of lavender viewing. We went to Somerset Lavender, which is closer to Bristol. We find that the lavender bloom here is better than the one in Snowshill plus the weather is much better than the day before.




[21] You would need to pay £2 for photography permit. There used to have some pet bunnies at the compound of the store shop but we didn’t check out this time around due to time limitation. I did have some time to check out the tiny lavender plants on sale. I was amazed by the many different types of lavender plants out there. There were quite cheap too, < £10 per vase if I’m not mistaken. Was tempted to purchase one, but I’m not really the green finger kind :P




[22] Last year, the same time lavender was in bloom, so was the sunflower. However, this year this was not the case. Just 2-3 tiny sunflowers in sight. So dissappointing :(




[23] I’m not sure what flower this was, perhaps orange chrysanthemun? (or did I just made this one up huhu). We saw one of the farm worker ruthlessly trimming unwanted weed/plants with a super-cool portable battery-operated lawn mower. It look very efficient while at the same time very lightweight. When we saw this, we feel tempted about getting one for our dads.




[24] Me flying in the air! While we were busy jumping around, hubbykun phone went flying too. I forgot my phone in the car and had to head back to the car park to retrieve my phone in order to look for the amiss phone. Thank god for ring tone or we would have needed to spend some valuable time looking for it!




[25] We saw that there was also hay stack fields at both sides of the lavender field and decided to quickly take some photos here before heading out to our next destination.




[26] Hubbykun offering some futile help to my effort at pushing the hay stack? :P Usually hay stack comes from the remains of wheat or barley field after harvesting, but this one didn’t look like it used to be any of those.




[27] I told hubbykun I wanted to do something a little different than flower hunting as the next activity such as an enjoyable scenic walk. So, my forever kind hubbykun did a bit of research on recommended walks. I think I’ve mentioned before that among the best scenery could be found in South West of Britain especially beautiful cliffs and countryside. I felt very lucky that we are living in the South West area, while at the same still time being close enough to London (~2 hours away).




[28] Based on the website description, there are 2 recommended walk trail in Hartland area (Hartland Point & Hartland Quay). Both of the routes were categorised as easy. How convenient eh? also with this I’m well prepared of what I was getting into? :P The walk was very flat and not too long either. Hubbykun came across this page while googling. The website offers plenty of options for highly recommended, and even categorize the walk according to level of difficulties easy/medium/hard/suitable for disabled etc.




[29] In actual, we have chosen to go to Hartland Point because it sounded much more interesting. But, we accidentally went to the Hartland Quay walk first. The glacier formation due to the sea waves were simply stunning! It was super hot + sunny day. Luckily, I have my umbrella with me. Although I’m pretty sure I received some funny looks because the locals simply love basking in the sunlight. Being a typical asian (not sure if this is a fair generalisation :P), I really hate getting sun tanned. Hubbykun was commenting  during our trip in Budapest recently, that he wished he knew the trick all along. It would have made his life easier i.e. to convince & make me happy/willing to to walk in the hot weather during our previous trips :P




[30] The only establishment in Hartland Quay was a local pub. But there were plenty of benches and picnic area available. I also saw some talented painters at work. We didn’t spend much time here, because we wanted to check out the Hartland Point walk too.




[31] I must say though that Hartland Quay was much nicer in comparison. The highlight of Hartland Point walk is this old light house that somehow is not accessible to the public, what a shame. I think it has been privatised or reserved for some purpose. Anyway, the route looked like not many people has explored it for some time. Tall weeds have begun to cover the path, making us a little unsure about where the path goes.




[32] This is a radar tower that we thought in the beginning was the light house. We thought the old light house has been replaced into a more futuristic design. We were commenting that the website picture must have not been updated, seeing how dissimilarity the image was. Turned out we were in the wrong :P




[33] finally, a video on the eventful weekend! If you can't see the video, click right here.








>