Springtime at Amesbury Abbey retirement village is heralded by carpets of daffodils and bluebells which flank the long drive up to the ancient building and surrounding cottages.<\/p>\n
The river Avon which cuts through the gently undulating 35-acre landscape is a favourite picnic spot in summer for the retired residents who can enjoy a spot of fishing and family fun with the grandchildren in this idyllic spot near Stonehenge in Wiltshire.<\/p>\n
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The animated twitter of the birdlife is matched only by the excited chatter of the property owners who love to stroll the grounds where England\u2019s first Queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine is said to be buried, and meander down to the fresh water spring that never freezes where early hunter gatherers settled to build Stonehenge.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe do live a sybaritic life,\u201d admits Marigold Routh, 86, who has lived at the abbey for five years. She owns a one-bed ground floor apartment with a patio.<\/p>\n
Like many retirees it was a wrench for her to give up her family home \u2013 but a bigger one giving up her garden.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had a two-acre garden with a wildflower meadow and walled garden,\u201d she muses. \u201cI have to say I miss the garden more than the house but look at this.\u201d She gestures toward the patio she has filled with raised beds and plant pots and the grassy area beyond.<\/p>\n
\u201cI grow clematis, dwarf roses, daffodils and geraniums and don\u2019t have to bend down too far to look after them. There\u2019s even a heated greenhouse where I can keep my geraniums in winter.\u201d![\"\"](\"http:\/\/newclone.retiremove.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/IMG_39231.jpg\")
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Marigold, who has a natural sciences degree from Oxford University worked in plant physiology for ICI in the 1960s at the cutting edge of weed-killer-and-insecticide development, and loves being surrounded by plant life.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have beech trees here which were planted by the Duke of Queensbury in the mid 18th<\/sup>\u00a0century,\u201d she explains. \u201cLimes and cedars of Lebanon which were planted in the 19th<\/sup>\u00a0century and a giant Sequoia redwood from America.<\/p>\n \u201cI love popping down to the river to see the wildflowers and pottering in the greenhouse.\u201d<\/p>\n The Abbey was converted into a retirement village by the late Mary Cornelius-Reid, an earlier pioneer of retirement communities back in the 1950s, who added mews cottages and apartments, and a building that has the oldest continuous thatch in England.<\/p>\n \u201cAll the residents love the gardens, they are so important to their wellbeing,\u201d says Mary\u2019s daughter Naomi Cornelius-Reid who now runs the family business with her two siblings.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is so much space for our residents to enjoy; there\u2019s the river, woodland, and acres of grounds. We put on lots of events in the summer; picnics, barbecues by the river, fetes, fairs and a Proms in the Park.<\/p>\n \u201cMany owners have had gardens which they miss more than their houses but here have all the benefits of a big garden without having to look after it. People can also have their own little gardens if they want.\u201d<\/p>\n