The Hirsel and Bughtrig Garden
This 9km walk starts in Coldstream from which you can look across the River Tweed into England. To start with, we walked along the river through the Lees Estate stopping to admire Lees House and Lees Temple, an octagonal 18th century gazebo.
After a while, the other side of the path was lined with wheatfields. When we reached the farm track at Fireburnmill, we headed back up to the road.
Crossing the road, we entered another estate, The Hirsel. This has been the seat of the Earls of Home (pronounced Hume) since the 17th century and the earliest parts of the house (not open to the public) date from then.
When the 11th Duke married Lady Lucy Elizabeth Montague Douglas in 1832, his estate was amalgamated with that of the Douglas family. The present Earl is the son of Sir Alec Douglas-Home, the 14th Earl, who gave up the title in 1963 to serve as Prime Minister. I can just about remember that.
There are 500 acres of park to explore, including a lake and a small river, the Leet Water. The Cow Arch provided access to the riverside pastures for the Hirsel herd of cows.
Some of the out-buildings have been made into a small visitor centre and café where we had a good lunch. We then made our way back to Coldstream where our car was parked in this pretty square.
There was still a lot of afternoon left, so we decided to visit nearby Bughtrig Garden as well. Bughtrig, which means farm on a ridge, has belonged to only three families in its traceable history from the 14th century: the Dicksons, the Franks and, since 1938, the Ramsays. The present house was built for the Franks in the late 18th century – it and its surrounding lawns are not open to visitors.
The formal garden, however, is a delight and we spent some time wandering about, as well as relaxing on these rather unusual loungers (which were quite tricky to get off).
The owners, William and Natasha Ramsay, have also started a sculpture garden, beginning with a bronze statue of William’s grandfather, Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay, who commanded the evacuation from Dunkirk and was subsequently killed on active service in January 1945. I recently read that plans have been approved for a small museum to the Admiral at Bughtrig.
Unfortunately, I didn’t note what this sculpture was or who it was by.
However, I can tell you that these are Godwin and Bernard. Godwin is a 14ft Rastafarian “a monument to cool” by Araba Ocran. Bernard is a life size camel by Josh Gluckstein. He bears a notice saying “Please forgive the state of poor Bernard. He prefers the desert and has suffered in the Scottish climate! He will be back all patched together in due course.”
By this time, the weather was cooling and our stomachs were rumbling, so it was time to head back to our cosy holiday cottage for some dinner.
The Glasgow Gallivanter 
I like the idea of a cow arch. Along the Banff Parkway, there are similar bridges for elk and deer to cross the highway (although not quite so picturesque).
Jude
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Oh, I remember them! Great idea.
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I love that gazebo! I’d ask if it could be transported to my back garden, but I’m pretty sure it would fill the entire thing – it’s only about three metres long! Bernard is lovely too, even though he’s seen better days – I have a soft spot for camels because my favourite childhood story was “How the Camel Got His Hump”. I read today that the jaw has fallen off one of the Crystal Palace dinosaurs, though they think it was vandalism rather than accidental, which is just sad!
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I think you’d have trouble with the gazebo! So would we and the neighbours might not like us knocking their fence down…
Camels look lovely with those long eyelashes but are supposed to be bad tempered I think. Poor dinosaur!
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Hi Anabel, This is a very diverse area for a walk. The loungers made me smile. Likely even more fun watching you and your husband getting off of them. Fascinating photos. I cannot truly imagine what Bernard looks like in real life.🙂
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We were glad not to have any observers!
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Lovely gardens indeed – loved the Camel. I kind of remember Douglas-Home as Prime Minister. Not too keen on the loungers though. Hard enough to get in and out of a hammock.
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I think Douglas-Home is probably the first politician I remember. The camel was very cute even in his tatty state!
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Beautiful gardens
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Thanks Kelly, they are.
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Love all the photos, but I find those of the Coldstream walk particularly beautiful.
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Thank you Sarah, it was a lovely walk.
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How neat to stand on one side of the river and see another country on the other side. Not something we can do here. 🙂 Our best friends are Douglases who come from Drymen. They live here now, but before they moved we went to visit them, in 1999. We took photos of their son pretending to be the Black Douglas in the Douglas garden at Stirling Castle.
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Yes, you would have difficulty seeing another country! Douglas is a fine, traditional name and Drymen is a nice wee place.
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And the Douglas tartan is very nice too. Jock wore his kilt etc to our daughter’s wedding and he looked very dashing.
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Ah, how the other half live with their vast country piles. How nice of them to open up their gardens so us plebs can have a look around. I’m feeling rather bolshy this afternoon, can you tell? As for those chairs I think the trick is to roll out! As you say, not very dignified 🙂
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They are very kind (as long as we pay a suitable amount for the privilege of course)! I think we did an approximation of rolling out involving bums in the air. Not a pretty sight, but fortunately there was no one else in the garden.
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🤣
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Hi mam, I hope you are doing so well. I have nominated you for the Ideal Inspiration Blogger Award. I hope you will accept my invitation and will surprise me with your wonderful answers.
Link for the Award is: https://idealinspiration.blog/2020/05/23/ideal-inspiration-blogger-award-ii/
Kind Regards
Rising Star
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Thank you, that’s very kind!
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Always 🤗
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That must have been a lovely day out – and the flowers are so lovely. When I saw the photos of you in the chairs I thought they looked so comfortable, and in my dream garden it might be nice to have a couple. However, if they are hard to get out of, then maybe I will cross them off my list!
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They were indeed comfortable – must be the shape supporting your back I think. If you don’t mind a slight loss of dignity as you get out, they’re fine!
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Perhaps there is an online tutorial giving instructions for how to get out in a dignified manner – there are instructions online for everything these days! 😀
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What a lovely day out. The walk looks great and love the statues and especially the comfy laid-back chairs. Not sure I’d want to get out of them though.
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I think there is general consensus about the chairs! I was surprised, given that they were wooden, that they were comfortable, but made a rather inelegant dismount.
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A new area for me. Looks an interesting place. Like the matching reclining chairs.
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New to us too. Lovely place.
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Lovely estates! The flowers are beautiful, and those chairs look quite comfy.
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Comfy, but tricky to get in and off with dignity! Wouldn’t have tried it if anyone else had been about.
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Anabel – I’m just getting back to reading blogs after a semi-sabatical. Nice to see yet another place to enjoy a walk – sturdy old underpasses, a flower-filled row boat, glorious gardens and all – just what I’d hoped for from you! Thanks – Susan
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Thank you Susan So nice to see you back again.
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What a beautiful walk. I love the Square.
Next time, please include a little video of you and John getting on and off of the wooden loungers. I’m pretty sure that I wouldn’t be able to do it gracefully! 😀
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I willingly confess that we couldn’t either! Inelegant would be a reasonable description.
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Thank you for the walk 😀
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Thank you for reading it!
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Interesting visit. Thanks for the tour…(Suzanne)
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Glad you enjoyed it!
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Hi Anabel – well that was interesting … and I love the Bughtrig Gardens … while lunch sounded good let alone getting home … beautiful area … all the best – Hilary
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The gardens were a lovely end to the day. I hadn’t heard of them before.
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I’ve seen those types of loungers in designer gardens (like at Chelsea). They seem like the most unloungeable loungers in the world!
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Once you’re on it, it’s actually quite relaxing!
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The lounger looks somewhat comfy, despite getting hard to get into. The gardens are lovely, and I love the last two sculptures of Godwin and Bernard. 🙂
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It was surprisingly comfy! Godwin and Bernard were definite assets to the garden, especially Bernard.
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The lounger definitely is different. I wonder if it was designed with humans in mind.
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It was surprisingly comfortable – getting off without toppling it was not awfully dignified though!
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A really lovely town square. 🙂
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Yes, very pretty.
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I love the garden photos. But I suppose a video of the two of you getting off the loungers would have been an excellent addition to the story.🙂
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It might not have been very dignified!
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I like the name of the Cow Arch and the bright flowers but my favourite just has to be Bernard the camel – a shame the Scottish climate has been detrimental to his health, I hope he gets patched up soon 🙂
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Bernard is a cutie! I hope he’s in comfortable self-isolation somewhere.
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