Nothing like making the most of a few days in Cyprus – what a stunning location for this Botanical Garden which is also home to Aphrodite’s Bath – the pool in which she bathed when Adonis first saw, and fell in love with her.
We also hiked up into the hills along the Aphrodite Trail – just beautiful!
On Sunday afternoon I was helping out at the Scotland’s Garden Scheme open day at Drumelzier Old Manse – I’d been excited about this one for quite a while as I’d seen photographs and knew it promised to be quite special.
It’s a traditional Manse garden in the Upper Tweed Valley (just along the road from the Botanical Gardens at Dawyk). They have the most gorgeous herbaceous border I think I’ve ever seen, bursting with colour. they even have their own Meconopsis ‘Hensol Violet’.
There’s a fantastic kitchen garden and in the lower garden they have a wonderful shade garden with a path along the burn. All of this within the most beautiful countryside, it really was quite idyllic.
I was on gate duty and we had over 200 people through within the first hour or so – clearly the sunshine, not to mention a couple of nice pieces of PR, had drawn people in from all over.
It was an absolutely super day, there was an organist playing and singing in the church next door, an excellent plant sale organised by Jane and Graham from The Potting Shed (another fantastic garden in the area that’s well worth a visit) and teas and cakes aplenty were served by an army of volunteers in the village hall.
Yes, I did buy more plants, although there wasn’t very much left at all by the time I got there. A couple of hostas, an ophiopogon (Black Mondo) for the rockery and a Lysimachia Firecracker. I already had an apple tree that I’d picked up from Quercus Plants en route filling my wee mini – it was like a jungle driving home.
Did I mention that I LOVE my job…
The rain showed no sign of abating but we were not to be deterred from our mission. Following Pitmuies, we headed along to Dunninald Castle, where not only did we get a brief period of light drizzle, we were also treated to a guided tour by owner Mary AND she gave us lunch #winning!
100s of acres of woods, a walled garden with a listed greenhouse, an ancient beech avenue which was awash with bluebells (in Winter it’s a great place to see snowdrops in abundance too).
Here are some photos to whet the appetite…
Sadly, the day we’d dedicated to some serious garden-visiting around Angus and Dundee turned out to be a cats and dogs (and bitterly cold) one. Nonetheless, we ventured forth and Pitmuies Gardens were first up.
Open daily April – September, here are some photos for your delight and delectation…
Disclaimer – this is actually my boss’s garden and I’ve been dying to visit after seeing it in a recent press article. Handily, our recent tour around Scotland made it the perfect place to pitch camp so we got to have a good look around.
I have both serious greenhouse and walled garden envy, and raised beds and polytunnel envy for that matter! In fact, this is precisely the type of garden I would love one day.
The physic garden is so interesting, everything is handily labelled so you can see what ailments the medicinal herbs can be used to treat. The pollinators must be going wild in here just now.
As if that’s not enough there’s woodland, a lovely lake, highland cows, pigs and chickens too and everything is organic.
I would definitely recommend a visit here – all you need do is email herbalistsgarden@gmail.com and they will happily show you around during the months of June, July and August – more info here.
Last week I was on a bit of a garden-visiting tour of Scotland, starting with a meeting at Fingask Castle at Rait where ‘Alice in Wonderland’ topiary is the order of the day. We also had a guided tour from owner Andrew Murray, who took us down the dell to St Peter’s medieval wishing well.
It was just 5 minutes down the road to Glendoick Gardens which is only open to the public in April and May – boasting a unique collection of rhododendrons and magnolias in the woodland garden it was definitely a sight to behold.
The perfumed Rhododendron Tinkerbird, a compact hardy hybrid was absolutely divine – sadly it’s been selling itself so well by wafting its wares all over the place that there were none to be bought in the garden centre but I have got my name on the waiting list.
There were flowers and colour absolutely everywhere and it was a real pleasure to wander around.
The garden centre and cafe at Glendoick, which are open all year are great – the sort of place you can spend a small fortune, and with a big smile on your face!
Yesterday was Scotland’s Garden Scheme’s biggest garden opening event of the year – The Garden of Cosmic Speculation at Portrack, near Dumfries. It’s a private garden and only opens one day a year via SGS and tickets were sold out a few weeks ago.
Designed by Maggie Keswick (the founder of Maggie’s Centres) and her husband Charles Jenks the garden covers 30 acres and is packed with gardens, landforms, sculptures, gardens, terraces and architectural features. It’s a clever and often humorous use of nature to stimulate the senses
I was lucky enough to be there, along with a raft of our volunteers, to help man the gates, the stalls and just make sure all the visitors had a lovely day. I did get a quick nose around but I only saw a fraction it. No excuse needed to go back and help out again next year, that’s for sure.
It was tiring but all the happy faces as people were leaving made it all worthwhile, not to mention the fact that we raised £thousands for charity. I still can’t quite believe that this is my job now – SO lucky! Next year, I’ll be sure to post this as soon as tickets go on sale as I can’t recommend it highly enough.
