Rutland is prime walking country, and there are many
paths to choose from. The Viking Way, going 147 miles up to the River Humber in Yorkshire, starts at Oakham, and follows the path of conquest taken by Scandinavian invaders. A short distance from the Viking Way are the Barnsdale Gardens, brainchild of Geoff Hamilton, the late Gardener’s World presenter and planting expert. His 38 individually designed gardens range from formal pool and knot gardens to a Japanese garden, a stream and bog garden, and a fruit orchard. If you visit, save time for nearby Exton and its village-green pub, The Fox and Hounds. Climb any of the nearby hills and you will be rewarded
with views of Rutland Water. This reservoir was created between 1972 and 1978, and filled by flooding arable land from the rivers Nene and Welland. Several settlements were lost to the reservoir, including the village of Nether
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Above: The village of Edith Weston on the south-eastern shore of Rutland Water. It is named after the 11th-century Queen Edith of Wessex, the wife of Edward the Confessor
Hambleton, of which only one prominent building survives: a handsome Jacobean hall on the waterfront. The sole surviving building of Normanton, close by, is its handsome church, St Matthew. The church lay below the proposed waterline, but was saved after a vigorous local campaign. It now stands like a sentinel on the lakeshore. Undoubtedly the pride of the East Midlands is nearby
Stamford. Much filmed and photographed for its spires and narrow streets, its history spans more than 1,000 years. The river was first forded by the Romans, then in the 9th century it became a Viking borough of Danelaw. Pottery, wool and weaving contributed to Stamford’s good fortune, as did its position on the Great North Road and the River Welland. But it was the merchants who arrived in Stamford in the
17th and 18th centuries who created the look and feel for which the town is now famous. Pioneering 17th-century
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