Sunday, April 11, 2010

More happiness: Tryon Palace, friendship, music, and iTV's Jane Austen clips...


I've been terribly remiss as of late regarding the updating of my blog. Let my dear readers know: it's not that I didn't have things to write... I just have been too preoccupied and distracted lately.

So, to start things back up a bit, I'm going to post a couple more pictures from Tryon... and also one or two of me and my good friend, Miss Victoria, who was a delight to spend time with and which is kind of how I discovered the existence of the delightful Tryon Palace and the lovely City of New Bern, North Carolina.


Reading the 'instructions'...

Isn't it lovely how they put up candles in the garden? They had a few weddings going on at the place when we were there...

Here's an alternate view of the garden from under the pillars above:

Somebody was enjoying herself too much and tried to get me wet... lol...

And then I had the brilliant idea of doing a picture that was kinda inspired by Emma Woodhouse in the latest BBC production of Emma (2009)... only, she wasn't exactly trying to hide here, lol...

And here I am in the garden...

Victoria in her very lovely outfit from Sunday... still in the garden...

Discovered the covered walkway between the buildings is actually nothing more than a walkway, notice how it opens up to the backyard through a thin wall...

Another fact that is of note, the stables have windows to the courtyard, which allows the courtyard to preserve its symmetry...

And I'm told this garden is mapped out like a butterfly...

Happy picture of me in the butterfly-shaped garden:

The gate is interesting too...

Then we discovered there were lights under the wood things to stand on at the guard posts:

Another thing, it actually has two gates, so here's how the view is on the town from the outer gate:

There were nice homes on either side of the gate...


And here's what the palace looks like from outside the grounds...

We even managed to escape without damage after driving around the cannon behind the palace:

At which point we went and walked around the lovely historic area of New Bern, North Carolina:

Including visiting the birthplace of Pepsi...

And there was another home we saw next to the palace on our way back...

And then for the Janeites, I was thinking about the theme music for the iTV Austen productions and finally discovered it can be downloaded/listened to in full and there is sheet music!!! So, let's start with two video collages... the first a fan video that is quite nice and the second is a trailer for the season.


Trailer:




So, as it turns out, the music is by Philip Sheppard and is called Crystallised Beauty. The sheet music is available on his website, as is a full recording that can be listened to. Click here for all this loveliness!