Up until now there have been two country houses in north Lincolnshire open to the public, and I work at both of them. Moreover, neither is any longer a family home although Normanby retains a family flat.
This week a third historic house was added to the other two when Scawby Hall opened its doors to the public, so I went to see it. With me I took Joe because he shares my liking for historic houses and Jess because of the Stubbs paintings.
Therein lay my mistake: they squabbled over the front seat as though they were both six instead of fifteen and twenty-three! And - the thing I really hadn't expected - none of the paintings by Stubbs was of a horse! One double portrait, one man and dogs, and one dog on its own. There were some horse pictures by Herring and others, but they were fairly unistinguished.
That said, it is a pleasant house with what promises to be a good tour once it is running more slickly. The first lady was all apologies: she had expected to be on the door an was having to read the script. She handed over to Sir Anthony Nelthorpe in the drawing room (when he returned from taking his son and daughter-in-law to the station) and he gave real value for money with his detailed knowlege of his family's history. The remainder of the tour was with a lady with a well-prepared script who clearly was a bit thrown by questions and interjections.
One thing that was very nice was that we were invited to sit down in each room to listen to the talk.
Finally Lady Nelthorpe saw us out and stopped to chat a bit; obviously they are doing their market research in the friendliest possible way.
Anyway, it is a nice Jacobean country house with a pleasing range of furniture and pictures, and a family history of mainly very decent people. Oh, and a garden which is stunning in places, but really needs just one more gardener to keep on top of all the trimming and tidying. Below is the herbacious border which is one of the first things you see and is quite stunning.
Bushka
Pro 
Looks a pleasant place...worth a visit, no doubt!