The Orchard, Grantchester, Cambridge..........

The Orchard today. The Orchard 1910


The weather here is absolutely glorious. I don't know why everyone thinks that our weather is so awful. I don't think that there is anywhere better than a hot English summers day. Yesterday was one of those days and I went to The Orchard in Grantchester, Cambridge. The Orchard is a corner of England where time stands still and the outside world rushes by. Apparently, more famous people have taken tea there, than anywhere else in the world.

The Orchard, first planted in 1868, became a tea garden purely by chance. A group of Cambridge students asked Mrs. Stevenson of Orchard House if she would serve them tea beneath the blossoming fruit trees rather than, as was usual, on the front lawn of the House. They were unaware that, on that spring morning in 1897, they had started a great Cambridge tradition. In order to supplement their income, the Stevenson's took in lodgers at Orchard House, and, in 1909, a young graduate of Kings College took up residence. His name was Rupert Brooke, the poet.

Some of the famous people who have taken tea in The Orchard Tea Gardens are:

Emma Thompson, John Cleese, Hugh Laurie, Peter Cooke, Stephen Fry, Tim Rice, Clive James, David Frost, Virginia Woolf, Prince Charles, King George VI etc. etc.

The weather is even hotter today and long may it continue,

Jackie