My book club book (due for discussion next week) is H for Hawk, a memoir by author Helen Macdonald about raising a Goshawk in a time of grief.  So it was pretty thrilling to go to the Morden Hall Park Country Fayre on Bank Holiday monday to see live birds in action.

Morden Hall Park is a National Trust property right at the end of the Northern line where the river Wandle, the river used by William Morris to power his factory, flows powerfully through.

It’s a place that manages to marry urban and country in seamless unity..and this Fayre was no exception.

A barn owl flying over one of Charlie’s class mates.

Full of people but still far from the Madding crowds, there were salt of the earth stalls like this man, quietly making the most beautiful and realistic flys for fishing.

In the grounds blacksmiths and basket weavers were practising their fine arts.

There was even time to catch bubbles..

With miniature steam trains, ferret racing, dog shows, lots of animals as well as traditional stalls..and not so traditional ones…it was a genuinely great and unexpected day out.

But that’s the nature of Morden Hall Park – they really like to embrace the wild.  In July they’re holding a Big Camp weekend with the opportunity to set up an overnight camp in the same field that Lord Nelson tethered his horse whilst he fished in the River Wandle and two days of ranger led activities with dinner cooked on a camp fire and story telling.  Just gutted we’ll be away…next time Rodders, next time..

Laters, Kate x