Snowshill

Snowshill is one of the prettiest villages I have visited in the Cotswolds, in my humble opinion.

It is a small village that probably gets overlooked by the more popular tourist sites such as Bibury but if you like to visit places with no crowds and enjoy taking photographs of quintessential places, then this is for you.

The village has a pub, a church, and a National Trust venue, Snowshill Manor

I couldn't think of a better place to spend my birthday in my fancy new hat!

We spent about 1.5 hours here exploring both and that should be all that you need, unless you intend to stop for lunch.

I think this is the kind of place that would be gorgeous at Christmas, I can imagine the snowy scene and decorations up.

It was a lovely hot day when we visited and I felt like I was abroad.

Parking was easy as there were lots of free parking spaces by the church.

There is also the lavender field nearby which we didn't visit as the lavender won't bloom until next month.

The village had so much charm and it was nice to walk around at leisure without hoards of people.

How gorgeous is this house!

We booked our tickets to Snowshill Manor in advance and upon entry were advised to head straight to the main house so that they could manage the numbers and keep everyone socially distant.

The house belonged to Charles Wade who was an avid collector of various items and within the house had over 2000 pieces.

Whilst the gardens were sunny and filled with cow parsely and lambs, the inside couldn't have been more different; it was dark and almost gothic in some rooms.

The collections include musical instruments, Cantonese display units, clocks, toys, weapons amongst other weird and wonderful things. 

I generally don't get excited by the inside of NT venues but this was a very interesting place to visit.

The exterior felt very European, for most of this trip I felt a bit like I was in France.

Luckily it was very quiet when we went and naturally we brought the average age limit down!

I am glad that we visited, it was nice to get off the beaten track so to speak and see other parts of the Cotswolds. I always love discovering new National Trust venues.

I really liked this model ship, the craftmanship was amazing.

I would definitely include this in your Cotswold itinerary if you are planning a trip. Are there any other NT places in the area that you would recommend? 

Leave a comment if you know of any secret gems!