It was a chilly day for our visit and the sky was pretty grey. And like many castles it was on top of a hill, which wasn't so great for us as we blew our way to the top. Although we did pretty much have the place to ourselves, most probably because there weren't that many people that were as mad as us. There were some, not many and the other two couples we saw there did the very British thing of making a point of visiting another part of the castle so that each of us felt like we had the place to ourself. It certainly helped with the photos.

There were some restorations underway, which you expect if you visit out of season, but it seemed there were some quite large scale works. It wasn't our first visit here, we visited one summer's day a few years before when the place was thriving with families and Saxon and Viking enactments keeping everyone entertained.

The castle is over 1000 years old so it's not surprising that some work is needed.

It's been a Saxon stronghold, Norman fortress, a royal palace and a family home - some home, hey? and in all that time it's dominated the Purbeck landscape. It's seen murder and war, paupers and kings and no doubt has seen much more than we can ever know.

It's another favourite childhood place of MOH's, with lots of family holidays in nearby Swanage, so a bit like Tintagel Castle he was keen to pop back and see the old place. It looked much different to even how I'd remembered it, so I can only imagine how much different it looked to him.

There was clearly some leaning going on...

And this red ivy leaf caught my eye among the greens and greys.

As it's one of his favourite places we had some fun posing for photos for a while, until we decided it was way too cold to be messing around on a catalogue-style shoot. The sheep didn't want to play either (and in case you're wondering, it is a different gate)

And so, I'll leave you with one of my favourite shots from our visit and a glimpse across the Purbeck landscape.

Do you have childhood haunts that you revisit?