Horsham; Saturday, 26 July, 2025

It wasn’t the greatest of nights sleep, but I was able to sleep in until about 8 at which point I got up, had a shower and headed down to breakfast. After breakfast I walked over to the Causeway to visit the towns museum and art gallery, housed in a number of old buildings knocked together into one which contains an eclectic mix of displays from the Horshamasaurus dinosaur discovered in the local area through the history of the town as some of it’s famous inhabitants, including Catherine Howard the unfortunate 5th wife and second beheading of Henry VIII.

The museum also has a large garden which includes a barn relocated from elsewhere that houses yet more exhibits – in the barns case looking at the agricultural history of the area, something which has faded away in the last decades as Horsham transitioned from the Market Town of a rural area to a dormitory suburb of Gatwick and London.

From the museum I headed back into the town centre to grab a quick lunch before having a bit more of a wander before picking up the Brighton bound number 17 bus to head about 20 minutes out of town to the village of Lower Beeding and the country house of Leonardslee.

Today the house is a boutique hotel, but the extensive grounds have been restored to how they would have looked in their heyday, having been under restoration since 2017.

The Leonardslee Lakes and Gardens are centred, naturally, around a series of lakes that cascade down a river valley, at the bottom of relatively steep slopes from the house at the top level and back up the other side to a deer park at a similar altitude to the house. Many paths and trails help you to explore the grounds, with hundreds of statues and installations dotted around the paths and grounds.

The site is also home to a small vineyard and a group of Wallabies who live in an enclosure near the main house. The estate is about 200 acres, so there is a lot to see and I spent a good couple of hours looking around before it was time to head back to the bus stop and catch the bus back into Horsham.

Back in town I returned to my hotel room and as soon as I opened the door I knew something was wrong. In the height of summer, in an air conditioned hotel, the corridor shouldn’t be cooler than the room. I checked the air-con and it was off, and wouldn’t switch on at all. I headed back to reception to enquire and the receptionist said he’d go and reset the aircon in my room.

30 minutes later and the room was still just as warm, and it wasn’t like I could open a window to try and get some fresh air in as all the windows are sealed, to make the air-conditioning efficient. I headed back to reception only to be told that the hotel was fully booked so they couldn’t move me and the impression I got from the reception was that they didn’t really care.

I headed out into the, much cooler than my room, town centre to grab a bite to eat and by the time I got back if anything the room was warmer still.

When I went to bed I had the big fan the hotel had provided on full blast pointed directly down on me, but I was pretty certain it was going to be a bad nights sleep, and I was proved correct as I only slept in fits and starts, with my sleep tracker saying I got less than 2 hours sleep all night.