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00:00Across the UK country estates have been transformed from private homes into national
00:10treasures where history and heritage because you get to play in the biggest historical
00:19sweetie shop in the world are surrounded by breathtaking landscapes it's magical it's
00:26absolutely magical I would actually stay up here in this series we'll soar above some of Britain's
00:33greatest estates this is fantastic we'll watch as the seasons change meet those whose families
00:44have owned them for generations it's an enormous responsibility but a great honor as well this
00:49place is constantly evolving constantly changing and the people working to conserve and restore
00:56them it is a huge undertaking it's about holding on to what is important and we're making sure it
01:02survives there's a huge amount to do and we will get it done well we'll get most of it done
01:17surrounding the village of Penshurst in Kent 30 miles southeast of London is the Penshurst place
01:25estate once owned by Henry VIII this medieval stately home is among the finest surviving examples of
01:3414th century English architecture much of its interior has been preserved for over seven centuries
01:45the house looks out over 11 acres of historic formal gardens brimming with fruit trees and roses
01:53beyond the walled garden are 200 acres of parkland and two and a half thousand acres of farmland and woodland
02:02stretching across the weald of kent
02:07since 1552
02:09penshurst has been home to the sydney family
02:12and dr the honorable philip sydney is the heir to this historic estate
02:18welcome to penshurst place
02:25well this is the barons hall the oldest part of the house
02:30one of the great things about penshurst is the family have never been
02:33wealthy enough to tear it all down and start again it's a lot of history
02:37the sydney family have lived at penshurst for over 470 years and philip has lived here since he was six
02:46years old when his father also philip inherited the estate
02:56it was just absolutely amazing growing up here a lot of space to run around whenever my sister and
03:01i were getting annoying my parents would say go and count the number of rooms in the house so we have
03:05yet to come cut with a concrete number to this day penshurst place was built in 1341 by entrepreneur
03:14sir john de pulteney who had lent large sums of money to edward iii during the hundred years war
03:21the king repaid him by loaning him the royal architect to build a manor house unrivaled in its scale and splendor
03:34it's been a place of hospitality for for centuries and centuries king henry the eighth held a banquet
03:39here hosted by the duke of buckingham that apparently cost about 1.3 million in today's money
03:45didn't do buckingham any good because his head was chopped off two years later
03:51after buckingham was executed for treason penshurst became property of the crown and henry the eighth
03:58used the house as his hunting lodge his son edward the sixth inherited penshurst and gifted the estate
04:06to his loyal steward sir william sydney in 1552 and the sydney family have lived here ever since
04:15we do occasionally use the state dining room for family dinners my 21st birthday dinner
04:21was here and we held the dinner here to celebrate the coronation of king charles iii i think it's
04:25great to share with people and i think having just a family rattling around here um i think would be
04:30much less fun this is the queen elizabeth room queen elizabeth is said to have visited here um i'm not
04:37quite sure how historically accurate that is um and as a family generally our policy is what we don't know
04:42we make up but it's called the queen elizabeth room because the an extensive association with queen
04:48elizabeth from the family sir philip sydney born at penshurst in 1554 was one of the most prominent
04:56figures of the elizabethan age a poet courtier and soldier he died fighting the spanish aged just 31
05:05and was the first commoner to be honored with a state funeral the eldest son of each generation
05:12of the family is called philip um i'm i think the ninth of the line there is pretty much all family
05:18portraits which is uh sometimes a little disconcerting to have them all the eyes following
05:22you philip will inherit this historic estate from his father and become the next viscount delisle
05:30we talk a lot about what you call the mufasa moment where you get sat down and you know everything
05:34the light touches is our kingdom and i don't remember that happening for me it just comes to
05:39be a sort of very slow realization it's an enormous responsibility but a great a great honor as well
05:44to have access to so much history and to be able to share it it's enormously exciting to be able to take
05:50the house into the next generation we've been dealt quite a lucky hand and so um it's our responsibility
05:56really to sort of play it as well as we can 600 years after it was built penshurst place was badly
06:10damaged during world war ii to help fund repairs the sydney family opened their home to the paying public
06:18one of the biggest draws for visitors is penshurst's 11 acres of historic formal gardens
06:28divided by over a mile of yew hedging
06:33each year the house and gardens are closed during the winter months
06:38but in just a week's time philip and his family will once again open the gates of penshurst
06:45i've never got less than say 60 70 things that need to be done today and usually don't get done
06:51today yeah if you pay to come and see a garden you've got an expectation which we need to meet
06:57head gardener tony wiseman runs a small gardening team of six
07:02late winter early spring depending on who you talk to so we're getting ready for opening
07:07we're running around the gardens trying to do everything so the gardens are old so our first
07:13garden records are 13 46 and when you have older plants they require a different kind of maintenance
07:19there isn't an area in the garden which isn't formal and formal gardens require a lot of upkeep
07:25because it's all straight lines and it's all about the quality of the finish
07:28the gardens at penshurst are among the oldest in private ownership its centerpiece the italian
07:36garden was built in the 1560s the garden has grown to include an orchard
07:45rose gardens water features and a commemorative union flag
07:50in the southeast corner is the nut garden which was designed in the 1970s
08:00it includes a rose and wisteria covered pergola which is made of sweet chestnut trees
08:05sourced from across the estate
08:07you can see in here this is decay we have two types of woodpecker in the garden so they come in
08:15and they take this off and then that gets the rotten we're constantly replacing pieces all the way
08:19around because otherwise it will fall on people's heads and that's not good and the roses won't have
08:24anything to hang on so that wouldn't be good either replacing the chestnut in the pergola is at the top
08:30of gardener tony's very long to-do list it's a challenge always to get everything ready for this time
08:36a year there's a huge amount to do and we will get it done we will get it done well we'll get most of
08:42it done stretching out across the medway valley penshurst place estate includes 500 acres of woodland
08:52the forest is predominantly sweet chestnut with smaller plantations of silver birch alder larch
08:59and scott's pine each winter forester zach price coppices 10 acres of sweet chestnut as part of the
09:08sustainable forestry plan so you cut it all off at a single stump and then you'll get four or five
09:16shoots that come out of that tree and then that will grow up into a stool which will be multiple trees
09:22zach has been coppicing trees at penshurst for 20 years it's nice to be here and then watch what
09:33you cut and how it regrows watch the different ages of it as it progresses
09:43and chestnut's really good for fencing
09:45you just peel put it in the ground and you can get 10 years 15 years out of a stake
09:52as well as felling trees that will be sold across the country zach has been sent an order from much
09:58closer to home head gardener tony has requested some chestnut for the rotting pergola in the nut garden
10:06i think i cut this about 15 16 years ago so you can see some of it's pretty good really for the pergola as
10:13well for what tony needs where did i just see i saw one that was going the right way is it that one
10:22watch your feet so this one looks okay good size
10:27good enough for the pergola
10:48after being closed over the winter penshurst's small team of dedicated staff are busy preparing for the
10:55spring opening we do like a clean house don't we sarah yeah and we're the first people to notice
11:03when things aren't quite right housekeepers julie bowden and sarah white have spent the last three
11:10months dusting buffing and polishing every nook and cranny of this medieval manor including over a
11:18hundred items of arms and armor dating back to the english civil wars
11:24i'm very good at spotting fake armor in films now
11:29we've done all the swords in here quite scary some of them i mean they're very sharp aren't they
11:34do quite a lot of damage i think in the private side we still have the daily functions of a family
11:40really we've got the washing up the washing um all that on top of cleaning antiques and and all that
11:48so we'll just check the armor then head of collections nikki stitchman and general manager
11:54ben thomas are doing final checks ahead of saturday's opening it protects the armor
11:59from damp and also anything airborne as well we do actually have a resident bat here in the um
12:04in the varines hall and uh and so it protects from any bat residue i love this one with the bullet
12:11hole it's my favorite this is a really important part of the end of the close season beginning of the
12:16visitor season for us it's a chance to be able to to do our last minute checks to check presentation
12:21interpretation tweaks little improvements that we might have missed
12:25hey guys you're right yeah is it all right hi julie yes good thanks getting there yes just finishing
12:33the last room off and then we're all done it seems to get shorter every year our close season um so it
12:39really starts the day we close at the end of october and the housekeeping team are already moving in then
12:46we've been very busy obviously doing lots of floors doing all the dusting the chandeliers all the
12:53pictures julie and the housekeeping team work incredibly hard um over the the few short months
13:00they have the house and the collections would deteriorate without that constant care and attention
13:06there's always something to do and the thing is this sort of house because of its age we have
13:10problems with woodworm we have problems with moth so we have to basically monitor all the time
13:16so we need to have a look at those chairs as well next time i'm worried about the pins
13:20it's on the list it's on the list everything's on the list you sort of always think you're never
13:25quite going to finish and it's been in time and you're worrying about that but we'll get there
13:30which is the most important thing the team have just two days to get the house and gardens ship
13:35shape and ready for their spring opening our housekeeping team's amazing
13:50penshurst place estate surrounds the civil parish of penshurst over the centuries this historic village
13:57has grown alongside the estate the sydney family have a private chapel in the parish church
14:04and the old blacksmith's forge now houses the village shop forge stores which is owned and run by the
14:12estate i think this is a little tardis we stock everything you could think of really is a little
14:20gold mine to the village we know a lot of our customers because they come in at least once a day
14:27some of them come in at least three times a day i love working here and the worst thing is not being
14:35tempted by all the food especially the fresh fruit and the cakes oh no
14:44and forge stores isn't the only retail therapy penshurst has to offer
14:49so if i put the shorts up here and here yep wherever they are where they are here husband and
14:56wife team paul and trudy bowen are busy getting the penshurst gift shop ready for opening on the weekend
15:03we agree to disagree at times do you know where the fridge bag dicks went oh it's all right i found
15:10them i found them now christmas is finished we transform it into spring and summer yeah the
15:18nice thing with the gift shop it changes to the seasons wonderful look at that hey and we do one
15:24this end as well yeah winter months is totally different it's a lot quieter it enables us to do
15:32a lot of things behind the scenes but there's a lot of preparation happening uh to get open for the
15:37season once the season kicks in that's it we're off and running i do try to be a bit of perfectionist yes
15:48you like it to look good i do like it to look good we're getting to know what paul likes
15:51and that's what it is working together as a team isn't it jenny
15:58just a hundred meters from the gift shop the sweet chestnut tree that zach fell to repair the
16:04pergola in the nut garden has arrived back in the yard and gardener tony westmoreland is preparing the
16:12wood i'm taking the bark off to slow the rotting of the wood so that it decays faster with the bark on
16:19usually get as much of the brown off as possible down to the white and they'll last few more years
16:27this is a bark so it's about 50 odd years old it's about the same age as me actually
16:33but you can see all the hammered marks so you can see the tools are handmade just got an old
16:37ironsmith stamp on there the new ones aren't the same yeah yeah it's quite therapeutic
16:42in the nut garden head gardener tony is keen to get the pergola fixed ahead of the weekend opening
16:54do you know what should we take the post out first
17:00because it's all natural wood and because we're building to the frame not building to measurements
17:05it's it's it's you've got to judge it by eye almost
17:11okay yeah pull out of that it does need upgrading all the time it would cost a fortune to get all
17:20these posts and poles from local franchise plus it's more rustic i think i like more rustic poles
17:26instead of uniform ones
17:28from once the two tony's have measured the new beams they must carefully remove the old ones which
17:37are entwined in mature plants no i can't get that off because the other side this wisteria is
17:44well it's big isn't it yeah to the top post here down that's down in the middle isn't it yeah it wants
17:49to go in between that because we leave the wisteria to go up into the tree we obviously can't cut
17:55anything here so that's a threading it through the wisteria was planted in the late 70s early 80s
18:01which is the oldest wisteria in this part of the garden so it's not going to flex for us we don't
18:06want to cut it back it's not a lot coming that's going to break this this one was really not coming off
18:14no no i can't saw
18:24with the rotten beams safely removed the new chestnut can be built into the structure
18:32you love the smell of a drill in the morning
18:36chestnuts are really good to use it's really resilient it resists water
18:40and it's hard as well so it's got longevity if you use softwood you're done in no time at all
18:48you'd be a fool to yourself
18:52happy days good see the next one
18:59it's awesome
19:00much of penshurst estate sits within the natural flood plain of the river medway
19:14the medway and its tributaries are known as the wieldin rivers
19:23seven miles of the medway pass through penshurst estate
19:27and regular flooding leaves the banks of the river waterlogged
19:31making it ideal for growing one particular crop
19:37it's absolutely perfect for growing willows the the damper the wetter the soil the better
19:43to get the best quality trees penshurst local richard gray is ceo of cricket bat manufacturer
19:50gray nickels he leases two acres from the estate to grow willow trees to craft into top class cricket bats
19:59willow is almost more like a reed than a than a tree and it absorbs a huge amount of of water from
20:06the ground and it needs that water to to thrive
20:09in the willow tree nursery willows are cultivated from one to five years old
20:19and then planted out along the bank of the river medway
20:26john walder manages the penshurst willows and today his team are planting out two willow saplings
20:33when the first frost come they're dormant so like they're not dead but they're just asleep
20:40and then we can you can plant them and then as soon as the nice spring sunshine comes they will
20:45start to come alive again so that's the bat length of a bit of a around that we cut so if you imagine
20:51putting that on the bottom of the tree it's all about how many how many lengths of them you can get
20:55it it will take between 18 and 25 years for these willows to grow big enough to be made into cricket
21:02bats so this this tree here is at the moment 40 inches we would wait till it's at least 60 inches
21:14it's called tree hugging you put your arms around if you can't touch your fingers you never know they're
21:18ready to come up it's true hopefully in 20 years time we'll get a minimum of 40 cricket bats out of this
21:27out of this particular tree yeah
21:40after being closed over the winter season opening weekend has arrived and today the sydney family are
21:47once again opening their house and gardens to the public wow what a sun beautiful isn't it
21:56i love it yeah the dafts are all coming up as well which is amazing for the visitors
22:02and with the sun shining there are high hopes for a big turnout
22:08okay so we've got 19 minutes to opening so no pressure no pressure at all
22:13i'm going to take this off actually because i'm hot
22:20hey paul just about ready yes ready to go i think we're just about ready to go let's do it
22:25let's see see what uh see what the day brings and we know by the end i know it's a sunny day it's going
22:31to be good it's a sunny day it's going to be good head of collections nikki and visitor coordinator
22:35deborah morgan have one final task to do we need to get the charcoal
22:43we light the fire just at the winter weekends basically so it just gives it
22:48it doesn't really heat up much but it does give it a little bit more of a sort of atmosphere for
22:52the visitors when they come in not great with fires
22:55just oh and then if you just just straight in that's it
23:06should take now so we'll just give it a little time and then hopefully it'll do its own thing
23:11with the fire lit there's just time for nikki to welcome back her team of loyal stewards
23:16well i've been here for over 20 years and i love it so much it's like a family it's absolutely
23:25wonderful well hello everyone welcome back thanks for coming it's very exciting we've got a lovely day
23:30for it today it's lovely when you get to that point and you're just like right okay
23:36we're going to open whatever's ready what's ready is good and if it's not ready we'll work on that later
23:41good morning welcome to pences please come on in hello good morning ladies do come on in
23:54it's nice to see people waiting at the door
24:01all the hard work has paid off with over 300 visitors through the gates so that's 30 pounds 78 please
24:09today's been very busy for the opening day of the season it's been great would you like a receipt
24:14it would be amazing if this is how the whole season went i mean you know sometimes there's puddles
24:19everywhere the tractors dragging people out of the car park and all that sort of stuff so if we can
24:24avoid that it'd be amazing and we're going to have a really really good year
24:27it's spring at penshurst place estate the 11 acres of formal gardens are coming into bloom
24:46and the willow trees in the cricket bat nursery are beginning to show signs of life
24:50but penshurst's association with cricket goes back much further than this plantation
25:01penshurst place is home to one of the oldest privately owned cricket grounds in the world
25:08so my house is just there in penshurst place so i've got a flat just above the main doors
25:14you can see a little bit of goosebumps to it to an extent because it's like
25:17it's a historic house and you've got a little flat inside it not everyone can say i've lived in
25:22penshurst place i've got several roles within the club groundsman picture secretary secretary
25:28junior coordinator head coach um it keeps me busy today club secretary jake cheeseman and groundsman
25:37clive croft i can't believe it's actually warm at last are making final preparations for the start of the cricket season
25:51the season starts at the end of last year so um once all the play is finished you then
25:57literally strip the square off reseed it and then you're nurturing it all the way through the winter
26:02time so it takes about six months probably to get it to this stage jake and clive have meticulously
26:09mowed rolled and cut out 16 cricket wickets and i just feel an honor to keep it going you just want
26:17to keep that legacy going hopefully it will keep going another 300 years
26:24the first recorded match to be played at penshurst was in 1724
26:29and the clubhouse converted from a cattle shed hosted the australian ashes team in 1961.
26:36we spend a lot of time getting the measurements just right
26:39so hopefully this bit is fairly easy
26:45so once clive's finished that i'll then put the marks in for the stumps
26:49knock some holes in
27:00i'm pretty pleased actually considering what we've had in the past i'm pretty pleased with the way this
27:04has turned out
27:08no mess ups yet so it's all downhill from now and for an april wicket that looks really nice
27:13i'll sit back and have a beer and can't wait for a cricket tea as well
27:21true to form the british spring sunshine comes hand in hand with spring showers
27:27and in penshurst's formal gardens the gardening team are racing to plant 450 lavender plants
27:40yeah it's starting to rain a little bit as long as it doesn't get to heavy rain and the water
27:44starts to puddle on the bed so we have to get this done as fast as we can without messing it all up
27:50i quite like the weather to be honest it's the you know classic english weather head gardener tony
28:00is making sure each lavender is planted in precisely the right spot slightly to your left please
28:09little touch more little touch more perfect we're making sure we have a right angle here
28:17and then this stick is a meter long it gives us the planting distance so if they're too far off
28:24you'll end up with a wiggle rather than a line there's there's always a good place for a wiggle
28:30just not here we're a garden of straight lines this is the union flag garden 800 red roses
28:381500 white roses and 450 lavender plants make up the union jack flag
28:46it was originally planted in 1984 and every 15 years the lavender in the flag is replanted
28:54the lavender's lovely isn't it yeah it's a nice smell it's better than the rosemary and sage that make
29:01you hungry definitely what you'll see now is that none of it's actually perfectly straight
29:07we're just going to walk back through what we've done everyone's going to have a look because we'll
29:14all see something different and then we'll mark it up so here's a couple i think we need to move so
29:20we'll move those yeah he's not quite right and if i can see it everyone's going to see it so there we go
29:27there's what's worth him about let's go on the mound and survey your kingdom
29:40it looks okay a bit more enthusiastic it looks really okay
29:45happy days yep it's another good day in the office
29:55penshurst's history spans nearly 700 years and like many historic houses the roof needs constant
30:04maintenance keeping on top of the roof is really vitally important i have to get that lead sword out
30:11they've been the lead passion yeah it's dropped out there so we need to fix that back again my mantra
30:15is if you can keep the rain out you're 90 of looking after the fabric the building underneath
30:20be up here in two weeks time do it again in 1836 a gothic style stable yard was added onto the house
30:30it was originally used as a carpenter's workshop but since 1970 it has been home to the penshurst toy museum
30:41it was opened by philip's grandfather william sydney who was gifted a collection of toys by artist and
30:47royal toy maker euther rose the museum has been untouched for the last 55 years but now thanks to a
30:58hundred thousand pounds from the national lottery heritage fund it's being given a major makeover
31:04by penshurst locals builder ash worcester i live in the next village of fortcom so
31:15literally five minutes to work it's very nice to have that very nice to work in such a lovely building
31:25and electrician alex daniel when we first started the job it was dark and gloomy and
31:30outdated and needed a bit of trc bringing it up to date but maintaining that nostalgia of the old
31:38the old building right and don't just don't drive it home because we will be adjusting it alex is
31:45quite famous for breaking things literally stripped everything back to the original brickwork
31:52that's taken a lot of cleaning with 200 years of dirt and dust on it lighting is obviously key
31:57you've got to be aware of the dangers of the old electrics and whenever you're doing anything try
32:03and bring it up to a safety standard of modern day and it's always quite challenging and now we're
32:08just finishing off with uh so some stub walls and shelving and then the display cabinets will be coming
32:14later i'm really looking forward to seeing it complete and it it will be great you know
32:20whilst the museum is being transformed the 2000 strong collection is being stored in the coach house
32:29across the courtyard and head of collections nikki is curating new items for display
32:37people send us donations without being asked at all this one just turned up in the post no note um and
32:43i think this one's dated from about the 50s or sixes as you can tell from the from the costumes
32:51you get a lot of visitors who come in and say oh i've got this doll would you like her
32:54i mean this one's just turned up on the doorstep
33:02as well as visitor donations heir to penshurst philip has been clearing out his own childhood toys
33:08stories morning morning hello hello box of tricks hey excellent you're too young to know who this
33:15is aren't you i've i've i've no i remember remember barely that's right what have you got uh well
33:21well this is this is from a slightly later era the 90s you know right um bebop and uh somewhere in
33:28his rock stilly um the teenage mutant ninja turtles um excellent kids still love those well the combine
33:35harvester inexpertly applied stickers is this oh this is slimer from ghostbusters brilliant i was
33:42a big big ghostbusters fan in my youth we don't have any ghosts at penshurst it would be very
33:46commercially valuable if we did um but sadly um if we haven't got any uh any spooks or spectres um
33:52so we had to make do with just you know busting imaginary ghosts
33:57and now we have another blast from the past a little cassette player that my sister had oh wow look at
34:04that oh that's gonna be brilliant a lot of people won't know what that is fabulous these were from
34:09various sources most of them up in the attic and i was rediscovering them through this new toy museum
34:14exhibition the old museum was great i absolutely loved it but it was getting a little a little on
34:19the tired side and nikki's had a vision and a plan for a long time i'm really looking forward to seeing
34:25the ribbon being cut on the new the new version
34:44it's july and with temperatures reaching over 35 degrees it's the hottest day of the year so far
34:52it's a bit too warm today we can't grumble penshurst's 11 acres of formal gardens are in full blue
35:04and in the nut garden visitors are enjoying the shade of the rose and wisteria covered pergola
35:11this is fab yeah it's nice and shady thank you
35:15today is hot it's it's in the mid 30s it's going to get hotter
35:27this is the bit that tony did in the winter all growing nicely around it all tied in
35:31no it's all good happy days top of head gardener tony's to-do list today is pruning the wisteria
35:38so all of this is this season so far and it will keep growing so this can do three meters in a year
35:45so it just goes so you need to take it back to stop it getting in the way of everything
35:56so some of it which is damaged will cut back now but if it's not damaged we'll cut it tie it into the
36:03frame it's just making so also it doesn't come around and slap people in the face when they're
36:08walking around i get a lot of satisfaction from people enjoying the garden we still have a lot to
36:16do in the garden the garden never stops it always keeps moving i'm never happy with the garden it'll
36:23always be better next year a garden this work is never done just outside the walls of the garden to
36:39the north of the house is a spring-fed lake known as land cup well as temperatures continue to soar
36:47an intrepid group of open water swimmers are headed to the lake to cool off
36:53for the last year the group has swum every other week even cracking ice in the winter months
37:05i'm very excited to be getting here are you excited to be getting it out there
37:09yeah ready to cool off definitely today local helen is joining the group for the first time
37:17i've walked here many times but never swam yeah my friends have encouraged me massively but i'm a bit
37:23nervous it'll be lovely i'm sure
37:34ah yes i don't like the ground
37:43wait wait wait i'll come in can you touch the buttocks yeah oh that's all right
37:47that's fantastic
37:55laura ansell runs this open water swimming club
38:00i used to come here as a little girl all the time used to live locally used to play in the park used
38:04to walk around the old house and i always knew that this well existed and i always wanted to swim here
38:10it's just such a beautiful backdrop it's it's stunning out here
38:16it's an opportunity to just detox from work life from family life from technology
38:22and just ground yourself back into the countryside
38:27it's amazing it's 24 degrees it's just fantastic surroundings so peaceful like being in the mid really
38:35triathlete ella who has just completed an iron man is taking some time out of training
38:41so it's really nice to have somewhere that's just a little bit calm no one's kind of trying to race
38:47each other which you wouldn't tell right now but as someone who is disabled being in the water is like
38:51the most freeing thing i feel almost weightless in the water i really don't have to worry about what
38:58my legs are doing um so much um so yeah for me it's a real freedom being in the water and i love that
39:06from the moment we opened here we had queues of people coming in it makes me really proud seeing
39:12all these people coming and seeing that vision and joining in as well it was wonderful it was like a
39:18warm bath it was really lovely it was actually amazing it makes you feel really lucky i was really
39:24nervous at first to be fair but it was just wonderful really was it's just so calming i will
39:31definitely be back yeah it's good good it was amazing in there absolutely glorious it was like
39:40cold patches and warm patches it was really nice just to have a kind of no pressure swim and just
39:46sort of float around so yeah i feel really good
39:48on a really hot day it's the best place to be is just to cool off and i'm now ready to get in and
39:55have a swim myself
40:06it's midway through the season at penshurst's historic cricket club
40:13square's held up pretty well i'm really really pleased with it groundsman clive and club
40:18secretary jake are enjoying their handiwork i love it makes all those early mornings worthwhile
40:26and this is no ordinary match every july we've got this fixture it's a good afternoon out and a nice
40:34tea plays the right sort of spirit today is the annual derby penshurst park cricket club versus
40:43pennshurst place estate and it's pulled in quite the crowd some of them are very very good penshurst park
40:50some of our team are not quite so good they don't play very often so it can be a bit interesting the ladies
40:58and i are here for the tea obviously yeah it just makes a bit of a change rather than fishing but
41:03it makes life i'm sure most of them enjoying the afternoon from work out the office they offered us
41:09sausage rolls
41:13preparing to bat for penshurst is heir to the estate philip
41:18i really enjoy playing when i get the chance and having the estate match is a really good chance to
41:22get out there um and score no runs and hopefully get in the way of a ball or two
41:27joining philip are ash and alex who are taking a break from working on the toy museum
41:33i am a regular cricketer yeah played for about 30 years trying to retire but still enjoy it too much
41:39i've played for about 30 minutes toy museum is going very well it is finished yeah we're getting there
41:45yeah so uh deadline is looming uh and it's all kind of go go go at the minute
41:56currently we've got a brief shower it looks like it could be long and heavy for about 15 minutes
42:00the covers are now coming on hopefully it's only a 10 15 minute shower and then we can
42:05get back on and finish the afternoon after only a brief huddle in the clubhouse play can resume
42:12and club secretary jake is headed out to bat kit rawlins is team captain jake's amazing i mean
42:22he does everything around here when he joined the club it was you know quite an old boys club
42:27i think they won't mind me saying and he's really transformed it
42:30and last up to bat for the estate is philip i'm not sure i'm going to be troubling the scorers too
42:43much but you know we shall see
42:52yeah it's great to see philip up here he comes up every now and then he's quite busy most of the time
42:56i think but um yeah nice to have the house represented
43:05i came out with five not out arguably i've made a terrible mistake i set myself too high a bar for
43:09next year
43:16tea's very very good very nice indeed unbelievable amazing amazing it's chocolate cake
43:23so tea is very superb everyone seems to be enjoying the chocolate cake by the looks of it
43:31a really good time it's a really good chance to all get together and have a
43:34jolly time on on a pretty pretty special surroundings
43:43it's been a busy summer season at penshurst place estate with visitors exploring the house
43:49and gardens today staff family and friends are gathering for a very special event
43:59in the stable yard head of collections nikki just twist that one around a little bit and electrician
44:05alex so i have to do an emergency run to these supplies to get some bulbs are making final touches
44:11ahead of the grand reopening of the penshurst toy museum there's a bit too much in the cabinet i
44:18think but it'll be all right for today i can't wait for people to see it obviously i'm nervous because
44:25everybody loved the old toy museum i feel we're as ready as we can be
44:32good morning um my lords ladies and gentlemen um boys and girls it's wonderful to have you all here
44:38at penshurst place for the relaunch of our toy museum it's almost 55 years to the day
44:43since my grandfather first opened the toy museum in in 1970. philip has asked his eight-year-old
44:49niece hetty to do the honors of opening the museum just as the heavens open there are brollies in
44:56the porch ready to keep off some of the rain after five months as a building site the toy museum has
45:12been completely reimagined over 2 000 toys are on display in seven new bespoke cabinets
45:20the collection spans 300 years and includes 40 toys donated by philip and the sydney family
45:31i did enjoy it very much and i am very grateful that they let me cut the ribbon nick and the team
45:37have done a fantastic job with the museum and i couldn't be prouder of them amazing i mean i have
45:42to say everyone seems to really love it it's a bit strange seeing some of my own toys on display
45:48and makes me feel like a bit of a relic myself but luckily my toys are far from the oldest on display
45:53and so hopefully i've got a few years of relevance left yet when philip inherits his family's ancestral
46:00land he'll become the 16th generation of the sydney family to call this great estate home it's really
46:09special to have such a strong family heritage and i hope i can play a part in that myself you know in my
46:15time it's very exciting to be able to i hope i'll write the next chapter in the family history
46:32so
46:37so
46:39so
46:45so
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