A rich heritage, and all on our doorstep.

A beautiful late Summer/early Autumn Saturday morning in England's East Midlands. Our area of the country is perhaps not as famous as many parts of the UK - we don't have London's glamour or glitz or wealth, or Oxford's "dreaming spires" or Cambridge's great and ancient seats of learning. We don't have the dramatic beauty of the Lake District or Scotland's Highlands or the gentle beauty of Kent - the "Garden of England" - or Devon and Cornwall's majestic coastlines. We can't claim to have the fame of Liverpool with its many famous sons and daughters or Manchester or Newcastle with their mighty links to the industrial revolution and the industrial might of the nation's history. Nor can we claim to have rugged beauty of Wales' Snowdonia or the deep cultural heartland that goes with the Male Voice Choirs of the Welsh valleys.

We are just "the East Midlands" - a place, of which it has been said, "It's where you drive through on the MI when you're going south to London or north to Leeds or Newcastle or Scotland." Indeed, when we have been abroad - in Europe, America, India, Australia and all places in between - if ever asked "Where in England do you come from?" and we answer "Nottingham" - we are usually met with a confused smile or a blank face; a place unknown, perhaps unheard of to many abroad. We learned many years ago to answer that question slightly differently and say "We come from Nottingham - you know, where Robin Hood lived". And then faces light up with understanding; everyone, it seems, knows of Robin Hood!

There was one exception to this general rule however, and it occurred at the Winter Palace in St Petersburg, Russia. On a bitterly cold Autumn day we had sought sanctuary in the café looking for a warming cup of coffee. A young waiter brought us our drinks and recognising our language asked in halting but good English where in England we came from. "Nottingham". we replied but before we could say "Robin Hood" the waiter's face lit up and he exclaimed "Brian Clough, Brian Clough......I know Nottingham I have been to see Nottingham Forest play". We then heard all about his time spent as a student in London and his following of English football teams! (For any readers of these ramblings for whom the name "Brian Clough" is an unknown he was a hugely famous football manager who led Nottingham Forest to footballing success in the 1980s and is still much revered both in Nottingham and further afield in the world of football).

But to dismiss Nottingham and more widely the East Midlands as of little interest and consequence is a mistake as today proved when Pat and I decided to take a trip to one of our favourite "haunts" - Bradgate Park on the outskirts of Leicester - a short 45 minute drive away from our home in Ruddington on the outskirts of Nottingham. Following Pat's surgery to remove a gallstone 5 or 6 weeks ago we are slowly getting back into our routine and getting out and about.

We have spent many, many happy hours at Bradgate over the years – summer picnics with the kids, dog walking, winter sledging, rock climbing – it’s a lovely place to visit. Mile after mile of open countryside, heathland, streams, deer, dry stone walls, rocky outcrops, forest land. It is beautifully maintained by Leicestershire County Council and the National Trust. The area around Bradgate is known as Charnwood, an ancient area with picturesque villages, thatched stone cottages, rugged highland rocky areas, woodland and sweeping countryside; it also has some of the most expensive houses not only in the Midlands but in the country as a whole. In short, a lovely place to visit. There are many specific areas to visit at Bradgate depending upon your desires - whether you are a committed "walker", or just want to enjoy the area. As we often do we opted today to go to the village at the heart of Bradgate, Newtown Linford, where we knew we could also enjoy a cup of morning coffee and lunch at the splendid "Park Kitchen & Deli" a busy little café opposite the entrance to Bradgate Park.

Bradgate's history is also the history of England. In the 11th century, following the Norman Conquest of England, the area was given by William the Conqueror to Hugh de Grandmesnil, one of his knights, as a reward for his assistance at the Battle of Hastings. The land, in those far off days, was used for hunting – but not only for pleasure or food; it was a training ground for Norman knights to ride on horseback as they hunted and so practice similar skills of balance as they rode, using their swords and spears much as they would in battle. The same use was made of the New Forest in Hampshire The name "Bradgate" derives from Anglo-Saxon meaning "broad gate" or "broad road" and the Park stayed in the hands of the Norman descendants who had invaded England in 1066 until 1445 when it passed into the hands of the Grey family after William de Ferrers' only surviving daughter married Edward Grey.

On passing to the Grey family it stayed in their hands for half a millennia until 1928 when it eventually passed into the care of the Leicestershire community 'to be kept in perpetuity and preserved in its natural state for the people of Leicestershire'. When the Grey family took over the land in the late 15th century they built a house – Bradgate House – and it was there that Jane Grey was born. The ruins of the house still stand (see picture). This was the famous Lady Jane Grey (see picture) known as the 'Nine Days’ Queen' who was a grand-daughter of Henry VII and a cousin of Edward VI. When Edward died, aged only 15, in 1553 he nominated Jane as his successor in opposition to his half sisters Mary and Elizabeth. Four days later, she was proclaimed Queen of England but within days Mary had gathered an army and Jane was soon locked up in the Tower of London awaiting execution in February 1654 aged just 16. Jane was no fool despite her early demise. She was regarded as the most learned woman of her day and was skilled in several languages - but, sadly, her learning didn't save her; to Mary she was a threat. Her execution was widely recorded as one of the great events of English history because of the bravery and demeanour she displayed right to the end.

Of course, the story doesn't begin or end there. Mary, the daughter of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon, had been declared illegitimate following the annulment of Henry and Catherine's marriage but now assumed the throne after Jane's execution. She in turn was soon replaced by her half sister Elizabeth, the daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, when Mary succumbed to what is thought to have been ovarian cancer in 1558. The rest, as they say, is history; Elizabeth's forty five year reign until 1603 became one of the high spots of English history, an age filled with many of the glories and great tales of English history; the age of world exploration by famous people like Sir Walter Raleigh, of high culture, of Shakespeare and Marlow, of Drake and the defeat of the Spanish Armada, of peace at home, of great statesmen and of settled government; Elizabeth and England, were not referred to as "Gloriana" without good reason.

So, in the glorious morning Autumn sun we enjoyed Bradgate as we have done so many times over the years - in a small way "touching the past" - the nation's past and our own.

And after an excellent lunch at the Park Kitchen and Deli we made our way home. On our way we passed through the little town of Loughborough - a place we visit every week or so to shop at its excellent market. Our son was at University in Loughborough, now one of the top universities in the country, so we know it well. And this unassuming little town is, too, filled with history if you care to look. As we drove through the town we passed within yards of the bell museum for Loughborough has a fine history of bell manufacture. Bells have been made in Loughborough since the fourteenth century and are rung throughout the country and the world – as far as California and the Washington National Cathedral. The largest bell in the world – 'Great Paul' – made the journey from Loughborough and hangs in Christopher Wren’s St Paul's Cathedral. Again linked with one of our nation’s great events – St Paul’s was built amid the destruction of Great Fire of London. When Pat and I holiday in Devon, as we do two or three times a year we like to visit the lovely Buckfast Abbey - one of the great monasteries of the country - and when there we can see and hear bells made in Loughborough, still being rung by the monks at the Abbey. Tomorrow (Sunday) we will go to Loughborough again to visit the Gardeners' Market so that Pat can buy some winter plants for our garden - and we will park on the car park adjacent to the Market Square and Queen's Park. In Queen's Park is the bell tower - The Carillon (see picture) is part of the museum and memorial to Loughborough's fallen in the Great War and contains 48 bells celebrating Loughborough's industrial heritage; of course, many of those Loughborough men who fell at the Somme or Ypres or at any time or place during the Great War would almost certainly have been employed in the bell foundries of the town all those years ago.

And so home - our quiet morning out over. The East Midlands may be unsung in the annals of the nation's history but it has played its part. Our little trip today took us back to the time of William the Conqueror, to Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, to St Petersburg Russia, to the Washington National Cathedral and London's St Paul's and to the Great Fire of London in 1666, to the trenches and horror of the 1914-1918 Great War, to the gentle beauty of Buckfast Abbey, to a young woman being executed on Tower Hill and to Norman knights practising their riding and battle skills thundering through the heathland and undergrowth of Bradgate Park, a place that gained its name in the ancient past at the time of the Norse and Saxon invaders of England; a rich heritage indeed, the sweep of the nation's great and often turbulent history and all on our doorstep.