OK, so I'm only a Cotswold wannabe

From our Cotswolds columnist, Catherine Moore, who said goodbye to inner-city London and upped sticks for Gloucestershire, for the sake of family life and more space...

'After seven years in the Cotswolds, I am still clearly not moving in the right circles. Not once have I featured in the social pages of Cotswold Life wafting around the polo club's summer ball, attending charity dinners hosted by Lady this or that or sharing a grand picnic lunch with a local shoot. I did once go to the ‘Open Garden' hosted by Princess Michael of Kent at her nearby manor house, in aid of the Red Cross. But the royal herself was nowhere to be seen and when I went on tiptoes to look through her windows, she'd hung blackout curtains all around the ground floor so I couldn't check out whether or not she'd washed up the breakfast things or pushed the Hoover round that morning.

'I'm sure the people who do make it into that social bible of the county set are perfectly nice people. But the events they go to look beyond dull. A new boutique opens in Cheltenham, a small art gallery in Stow-on-the-Wold has an exhibition of watercolours, a garden party here, a clay pigeon shoot there. Maybe it all kicks off after the society photographers have left, but somehow I doubt it.

'Of course, when we first moved here, I was intrigued to see the lifestyle sold in the pages of Cotswold Life so I fetched up at the Beaufort Polo Club's Country Fair. I definitely fell into the ‘them' category, as the ‘us' gang were roped off into marquees and lawns designed only for those with honours degrees in how to walk on grass in stilettos. And I must've been the only one there who thought a Seventies-style hooligan pitch invasion was happening when swarms of toffs stamped over the polo ground during the half time of a charity match featuring Charles and William. Princes to you and me. Everyone else seemed to know them. (The toffs were pushing down divots of turf kicked up by the horses in case you're too common to know).

'I was also clearly in the out crowd when I failed to join in with the waves of sympathy which swelled as a helicopter landed, bearing ‘poor Johnno' who was finding it such a pain to have to fly everywhere since he got banned from driving. And it was most definitely alien territory when the hunting horns signalled a parade of hounds, accompanied by nostalgic commentary from a huntsman remembering his first ‘blooding' and berating the massed ranks of nannying bureaucrats wanting to take his right to slaughter woodland creatures away from him.

The county set aside, people are much less likely to be schmoozing for work at a party or feeling they've got to be cool or glamorous in some way, which can make for some wild nights'Thankfully, hunt sabs throw better parties than hunt enthusiasts, so we liberal urban exiles don't have to say goodbye to our social lives altogether when we cut and run. In fact, as a recent incomer, a flurry of invites lands on your brand new doormat quite quickly. As another exile said - it's our novelty value.

'It's worth saying yes to everything to start off with. OK sometimes you do find yourself standing in the middle of a room full of strangers you have nothing in common with, clutching a warm glass of Chardonnay and wondering why you ever left your city certainties behind.

'Fortunately, that's not the norm. Friends of mine visiting from London have commented on how much quicker people around here are to let their hair down. The county set aside, people are much less likely to be schmoozing for work at a party or feeling they've got to be cool or glamorous in some way, which can make for some wild nights. And the fact that people tend to have more space helps, too. I've been to parties featuring fire juggling, outdoor cinemas, circus acts and a huge ten-person bicycle that blows bubbles and plays music.

'Who knows, one day, if I invest in inordinate amounts of chiffon and silk, I may grace the pages of Cotswold Life. Until then, I'll have to content myself with the one time I made the Stroud News and Journal, where I was pictured, after a couple of glasses of Pimms at the summer fete, enthusiastically joining in with the Jolly Stompers line dancers' interpretation of Achy Breaky Heart.'

Click here to read more from our Cotswolds columnist...

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