One part of the greensward is set aside for a cricket field. We just refurbished this area last year as it was showing its age after nearly a decade since the last spruce up. Yes, I know that Scots aren’t great cricket fans but the Estate has workers from all areas of the crumbling Empire, many who do play cricket. And we usually get a lot of summer visitors who also like cricket, but not obviously since the Pandemic started.
Summer weddings used to get held here very often, a major revenue generator for us. It’s amusing to us when wedding planners discover we don’t do amped music, don’t do fancy wedding food, and definitely don’t have a day spa for the bridal party to indulge in the day before. Despite that, we still do many weddings during the summer.
The greensward is big enough that a wedding can take place and still leave leave lots of space for kite flying, picnics, frolicking, book reading, sword fights (yes, really) and almost anything else you can imagine. There’s even a few spots where a good fuck in privacy among the wooded areas is possible on a quiet afternoon.
You might well guess that it’s a labour intensive exercise to keep this greensward healthy with heavy usage. It’s one of the reasons we beef up staff for the summer. It requires mowing, cleaning of grass and leaf debris, cleaning up after events, and so forth.
There are trees in some area of the greensward making for needed shade and breaking it up to create some area of privacy. Not surprisingly, the corvids think it’s a great place to perch and wait for someone to forget a shiny trinket or a bit of food.
If you want to know how long the greensward has been in existence, all I know is the Estate Archives say it’s been here at least since the Reign of Queen Elizabeth the First.
