Dear Readers, today was a cold, blustery but sunny day, and so we headed out to Trent Country Park, close to Cockfosters at the very end of the Piccadilly line. We’ve been here before, but last time there was a tremendous amount of building work going on on the site of the original country house, so we were curious to see how it had all turned out.

The entrance to Trent Park House

Trent Park itself dates back as far as the fourteenth century, when it was part of Enfield Chase, Henry IV’s hunting ground. More recently, the house was owned by Sir Phillip Sassoon, cousin of WWI poet Siegfried Sassoon, and the house was the scene of many extravagant parties, with guests including Sir Winston Churchill, artist Rex Whistler, and George Bernard Shaw. In WW2, it was turned into a holding place for captured German officers, with listening devices secreted about the house.

More recently still, the House became a series of educational establishments, with Middlesex University being in situ until 2012. In 2015 the whole estate was sold to Berkeley Estates and, as you’ll see further down this post, it has now been turned into a variety of houses and flats. Campaigners did manage to insist that a historical museum, showing some of the history of the estate, was included, and ‘Trent Park House of Secrets’ is due to open later this year.

The Country Park has been open since 1973, and features lakes, a café, a children’s play area called ‘Go Ape’ and, most enticingly for me, a wildlife rescue centre. Guess where I made a bee-line for? Though en route we passed through a very fine avenue (limes I think), and spotted the biggest bunch of mistletoe I’d ever seen in North London.

The Wildlife Rescue centre was founded in 1985 by June and Barry Smitherman, who work with other local charities and the police to rehabilitate and, where possible, release injured wild animals. Where this isn’t possible, they aim to find good long term homes for the animals in local specialist sanctuaries. They do, however, also have a range of animals in the park itself, a mixture of wild birds and mammals who have long term injuries and can’t be released, and some domestic animals who need a home. You can see a selection of creatures below…

Muntjac deer – one of two abandoned babies brought into the sanctuary. As invasive species, they can’t be released into the wild, and will spend the rest of their lives in the park.

Some very fine goats….

The poor heron below (Becky) was battered with a broom by someone irritated by her habit of eating the fish in a koi pond. She can no longer fly, but seemed very interested in the people passing by, maybe hoping that they had a spare sardine in their pockets.

So, it was good to see people who are caring for wildlife, who are working with other experts, and who, judging by the people taking their children around to see their favourite animals, are well entrenched in the local community. Everyone was being very quiet and respectful, and were teaching their children to do the same, which was lovely to see.

So then we headed off to the new housing estate. And what a spectacular show of daffodils there was, probably the best I’ve ever seen. Wordsworth would have been very happy…

But most spectacular of all was this magnificent oak, which must be a survivor from the original estate. What a venerable tree!

So in spite of the freezing wind, this was a great walk, a chance to wear my walking boots (the cosiest footwear that I possess) and to get a few steps in (11,198 to be exact). Trent Country Park is well worth a visit if you’re in North London, or passing through. And I can also recommend the raisin cookies in the café.