In this post, I will describe a day that we spent at Anglesey Abbey with our friends and kids.
Our friends came for the weekend, and on Sunday, we decided to go to Anglesey Abbey on their way back to London. We are all members of the National Trust, so we always visit one of their properties as we find it a very enjoyable way of spending a day.
We always visit National Trust properties, see my posts at the end of this post or read these ones: Greys Court and Hughenden Manor
If you are planning a trip to England and prefer to have everything organised by a tour, you should check the tours at Tourradar, which offers various tours to many places in England.
Tourradar has tours that suits every length of time and budgets and if you use my links to book your trip and enter code RoseG50 you will get a discount on your booking.
Subscribe to my blog, so you will not miss any of my posts published every week.
We had our dog Bambino with us, and they had theirs, a beautiful Cavapoo called Amber.
National Trust properties don’t usually accept dogs, even in the garden, which I find very inconvenient. Anglesey Abbey only accepts dogs at the café, so our husbands went for a walk around the area with the dogs and afterwards stayed at the café waiting for us.
We started taking the kids to the children’s area, where they have a playground and a tree house. The children spent their energy playing around for a while, and after that, we strolled through the garden, which was remarkably beautiful for that time of the year: winter.
We went in the direction of the house and entered it for the visit.
A LITTLE BIT ABOUT ANGLESEY ABBEY
Anglesey Abbey, located a few miles from Cambridge, is a country house with origins as a 12th-century priory. It was converted into a residence after the Dissolution and later restored in the early 20th century by Lord Fairhaven, who expanded the house and developed extensive gardens.
The interiors feature a mix of art, furniture, and books collected during his lifetime, presented much as he left them. The surrounding grounds include formal gardens, tree-lined walks, and a winter garden known for its structured planting and seasonal colour. A working watermill on the estate still grinds flour and offers demonstrations.
VISITING ANGLESEY ABBEY
We suggest starting at the Visitor Centre for a map and orientation. Get there early to avoid crowds. Walk the Winter Garden first; it’s designed for morning light, with vivid bark colours and structural planting. Loop toward the Lode Mill, a restored working watermill; you can watch it grind flour if it’s operating. From there, head into the formal gardens, the Dahlia Garden in late summer, and rose beds earlier in the season. Take time to walk the avenues (Coronation Avenue, Temple Lawn), spaced for visual symmetry and long sightlines.
Break for lunch at the café, basic menu, but local. Afterwards, tour the house. It’s not vast, but dense with 18th-century furniture, tapestries, and books collected by Lord Fairhaven. The rooms are preserved as he left them, emphasising function over grandeur.
End the visit with a slow loop through the more open parkland toward Hoe Fen, especially if you’re with children. There’s a nature area and a treehouse there. The whole site is walkable but spread out, so wear shoes for grass and gravel, not just paths.
We enjoyed the visit to the house. Externally, it has the proportions and symmetry of a Jacobean manor, but much of the current structure reflects Fairhaven’s 1920s–30s restorations and additions. Inside, it’s curated as a lived-in museum. Rooms filled with 18th-century furniture, silver, clocks, tapestries, and paintings, with a notable collection of books and art objects.
The layout isn’t grand in scale but is meticulously organised. Each room reflects Fairhaven’s taste for order and display: the Library with its deep shelves and portraits; the Tapestry Room lined with rich woven panels; the Dining Room set for entertaining in mid-century formality.
Every object is placed deliberately, meant to be seen, not touched. Despite its historical layers, the house doesn’t aim to recreate a specific period but instead offers a snapshot of how an independently wealthy collector chose to inhabit and showcase an English country house.
After the visit, we went to the café to meet the husbands and look after the dogs while they went for some exploring of the house themselves.
It was another of our successful days out in the company of nice friends. We can highly recommend a visit to Anglesey Abbey.
I hope this post will give you some idea of what can be done in a day in Anglesey Abbey and will help you plan your own visit there.
HOW TO MAKE THE MOST OF YOUR VISIT TO ANGLESEY ABBEY
Below you will find a list of what to visit, where to stay and where to eat around Anglesey Abbey. I classified each place as follows:
BOLD – Visited, tried and recommended
NOT BOLD – Not visited or tried, but planning to visit or try and heard very good reviews
RED – Visited and tried but do not recommend, avoid or be cautious
*** – Excellent
** – Good
* – OK
£££ – Expensive
££ – Fair and affordable
£ – Cheap
PLEASE NOTE: Every hotel, restaurants and attractions I mention on my blogs are not sponsored reviews and we always paid the full price when visiting. We give our own opinion of the place and detail our experience, good or bad.
THINGS TO DO
1 – Visitor’s Centre – ***
2 – Winter Garden – ***
3 – Lode Mill
4 – Dhalia Garden and Rose Garden
5 – Walk on Coronation Avenue and Temple Law – ***
6 – Tour the house – ***
7 – Hoe Fen – ***
WHERE TO STAY
ACCOMMODATION
1 – The Hole in the Wall – ££
2 – Crown & Punchbowl – ££
3 – West Court – Jesus College – ££
4 – Quy Mill Hotel & Spa – 4* – £££
5 – The Old School House Rooms – 4* – ££
6 – The Grapevine Studio – 4* – ££
If you prefer to look for your own accommodation, search and book via the below widget:
I use affiliate links such as the links above for Booking.com, Get your Guide, Viator and others. It means that if you use any of my links to make a booking, I will get a small commission from the partners I’m affiliated with without any additional cost to you. Please, use the links provided when making a booking, this is a way of supporting blogs like this so we can continue writing informative and interesting posts. I’m very thankful for that.
BEST PLACES TO EAT
RESTAURANTS
1 – The Pear & Olive Restaurant – ££
2 – Limoncello – ££
3 – The Hole in the Wall – ££
4 – Pattaya Kitchen at the Shed – ££
5 – Garden House – ££
6 – The Crown and Punchbowl – ££
We only tried the ones in bold , the others are the result of my researches and ones that I would like to try. If you tried any of my recommendations above, please send me a message and tell me about your experience good or bad, so I can update the list accordingly. Thanks!
If you enjoyed reading this post you might also like to read:
Leave a Reply