Raby Castle ~ August 2018 ~ The Deer Park.

Posted in Adventures, animals, castles & ruins, Fuji, FujiX-T2, landscape, nature, photography, wildlifeTagged , , , , , , , ,

EXTERIOR…..PART 1 HERE   PART 2 HERE.   PART 3 HERE

INTERIOR…….PART 1 HERE ~ Entrance Hall, Chapel, Baron’s Hall.

INTERIOR……PART 2 HERE ~ Small drawing room, Octagon Room, Dining Room

INTERIOR…….PART 3 HERE ~ Blue bedroom, Servants bedroom, Kitchen, Servants dining room.

 

We are finishing our time at Raby with a walk around the estate to see the deer, but first, we went to lunch.  The Stables have been converted into a cafe

at the troughs

and Sophie and I had a table in one of the horse’s booths or whatever they’re called. Stalls maybe I think. Anyway, I had a very trendy lunch of avocado and poached egg on wholemeal toast.  (I know it’s trendy because I’ve seen it in a magazine where they did a restaurant critique of a place in London). (It also had twiddly greenery bits on top of it which was another clue).

le lernch a la trend.

Seriously most places we go have a cafe but all serve similar stuff, homemade soup of the day, panini’s, chips, toasty sandwiches, you know the kind of thing, good, but easy. It was nice to see them make an effort to be a cut above.

After lunch we went and looked at the carriages for a few minutes

but were too excited to go and find the deer to stay very long there.

So off we went on a deer hunt. We started walking through the grounds, and in the distance, we could see the herd ~ we were creeping through the grass so they wouldn’t be disturbed

The unsuspecting

by chance I looked to our left and spotted these 3 herberts

They wandered off and we concentrated on creeping up to the herd. Of course they spotted us a mile off, we were as quiet as a buffalo on acid, and Sophie was wearing red 😀 😀

busted

We slowly crunched forward through the grass, keeping low, and the deer slowly edged off to our right and to the side of the copse of the trees you can see

are they still coming for us?

we kept moving towards them and the stag of the group must have said ‘Right my bitches, those red and green blobs are getting nearer, let’s scarper! and so they all went around the back of the copse, and then legged it up the hill and away.

 

Stag and his bitches off and away.

Sophie and I were undaunted. The estate is a huge place but fenced all round so the deer had to be there somewhere, and we set off in the direction the deer had gone. As I got to the top of the hill, and turned the corner, I came to a standstill, I’d found one!

Ooh’ello!!

They’d stopped as they’d got around the corner, and when Sophie and I got there they had to scarper again!

They’ve found us! Run for your lives!!!

They ran a fair distance then tried to hide under some trees

They’ll never see us here. Will they??

So onwards ever onwards, Sophie and I determined to get some good pictures! I hid in an old dead bush to get a bit closer

It’s in that bush you know!

As we studied the herd it became apparent that there was only one stag, surrounded by a harem of lady deers.   (? does as in doh a deer but who knows?)

You can make out his antlers if you embiggen the picture.

Mr.Big and his harem

 

it didn’t take long before they all ran off again.  We spotted a white calf (I think they’re calves, or maybe fawns, that sounds weird though) which seemed odd as there were no white lady deer and the stag was definitely big and brown.

Run Forest Run!!

We decided not to pursue them any further, we’d got some nice shots, and it was a long walk back.  But on the way back we did find a few more that didn’t seem to be part of that group, or could be playing truant!

drink up girls, no-one knows we’ve gone and we need to get into the woods!

And then the best bit, further on we came across these

Young Guns

 

and these are the chap-babies who’ve grown into young bucks, and are therefore competition for Mr.Big and so not allowed to be in amongst his harem.  But if you look to the right you’ll see a white face there,

Mr.Naughty

who has obviously succumbed to one ladies charms when Mr.Big has been busy elsewhere, hence the white calf/fawn thing.  These lads didn’t run away, they let us get quite close which made our day!

so there ends our trip to Raby castle, what a great day out!

A full album (yes there’s loads more! 🙂 of pictures can be found HERE

Information about the castle came from the following sites

http://www.rabycastle.com

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raby_Castle

 

Stay tooned, we’re back at Cheeseburn Sculpture park next time, some new art and some we’ve seen last time, but differently!

 

30 thoughts on “Raby Castle ~ August 2018 ~ The Deer Park.”

  3. Fawn/Kid/ Calf. All acceptable for young deer.
    It was very good of you to persevere to get the closer shots near the end. I have never seen a white deer, so that was worth the hunt.
    Ollie could have found them for you of course. He is something of an accomplished deer hunter. But he has a habit of chasing them too, so perhaps not. 🙂
    Best wishes, Pete.

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  9. Avacado Toast is SO trendy!! It’s served EVERYWHERE now!!
    “Right my bitches, those red and green blobs are getting nearer, let’s scarper!” 😂😂 OMG, I love it…. I can just picture you guys tramping through the tall grasses trying to be stealthy and failing miserably. I LOVE that picture with ALL the deer staring at you like “…. You really think we don’t know that you’re there??” 😂😂

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  10. Sounds like an altogether rather wonderful place to visit! Your pictures of deer are much better than mine – I get deer butts more than anything else. ;-(

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      1. I bet it was. Deer are such stunning creatures, as are moose and others similar to the deer. I think you did a splendid job with the photos – besides the fact I was laughing out loud as you and Sophie stalked them.

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  14. Fraggle I loved your commentary. And the photos are lovely. So clear I could almost feel the velvet on the young antlers.
    At first I thought it was a deer preserve, but I suppose they raise them for… the same purpose a most cattle.
    Still a beautiful place and another fun adventure. Mega hugs.

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