An English Spring - UK Garden Tour with Chelsea Flower Show
19-26 May 2012
Our ever popular tour of colourful well known spring gardens and English countryside in the early flush of the coming season, full of vigour and hope, culminating in the excitement of the fashionable Chelsea Flower Show near vibrant shops in the heart of London.
Buffet breakfasts every day and dinner each evening are included in the cost of your UK garden tour. We proceed at a relaxed holiday pace and you are welcome to take a day off whenever we are scheduled to return to the same hotel in the evening.
Saturday, May 19 2012
Our tour starts at the 4 star Ashford International Hotel in rural Kent for four nights. Make your own way to the hotel or we can arrange your early morning transfer from London Heathrow airport, with a pause for lunch (time permitting) at Leeds Castle. This evening join your tour director and the rest of the group before sitting down together for dinner.
Sunday, May 20 2012
This morning, in our coach, we take a country tour ending with our own exploration and lunch at the ancient Cinque Port of Rye. In the afternoon we go to Great Dixter House and Garden - The Manor of Dixter is first noted in 1220 and structural additions were made again in 1464. In 1910 the English architect Edwin Lutyens restored the house and designed the gardens. This is a cottage garden on a large scale. The late owner, well known gardening writer and lecturer Christopher Lloyd, liked to tease the followers of garden fashion.
Monday, May 21 2012
Passing beneath the White Cliffs of Dover, we drive to Goodnestone Park, a private 14 acre garden in parkland with fine old specimen trees, around an 18th century Palladian-style mansion with Jane Austen connections. A mature woodland garden with 1920's rockery has a pond and shrubbery. Three interconnected exuberantly planted walled gardens use the adjacent church tower as a dramatic eye-catcher. We have time for lunch and a visit to Canterbury cathedral before going on to the private Beech Court Gardens.
Tuesday, May 22 2012
We start with a visit to Pashley Manor Gardens, an immaculate garden with emphasis on colour and form around a Tudor house with 18th-century additions. After lunch we proceed to Sissinghurst Castle, a romantic garden around a slender brick-built castle tower, this is always one of our most enjoyed visits. Sissinghurst is surely the best known and most copied garden in the world. Its designer Vita Sackville-West's own words describe the garden: "Profusion, even extravagance and exuberance within the confines of the utmost linear severity".
Wednesday, May 23 2012
We visit Great Comp, an enormous achievement by two people who had retired in 1957 from a busy London life. This is an informal garden against a background of deciduous woodland with an apron of lawn. A wide range of ornamental trees and shrubs which relish acid loam are under planted with campanulas, geraniums, hostas, lilies and violas. We continue to Hever Castle, the childhood home of Anne Boleyn and place of her seduction by Henry VIII. It took 1,000 men and millionaire William Astor's money four years to restore this moated castle and its garden, with 35 acre lake, fountains, cascade, topiary chess set and magnificent original Roman and Italian Renaissance statuary. This evening we proceed to the Carlton Mitre Hotel at Hampton Court for the last three nights of the tour.
Thursday, May 24 2012
Today we make an early start to the Chelsea Flower Show, a highlight every time this world class show is in our itinerary. You will see magnificent floral displays, model gardens, garden tools and products, a host of garden structures and artefacts by world famous names at this classic event close to London's fashionable shopping. Return on our coach or stay later and catch a train back to the hotel. Time to make independent visit to Hampton Court Palace in the afternoon.
Friday, May 25 2012
Finally we visit Wisley Garden, the home of the Royal Horticultural Society. Full of ideas and information, the garden delights and inspires in any season of the year. Part of the garden is always at its best. The shop offers as large a collection of books on gardening as anywhere in the world. Here is a wonderful chance to buy gifts to take home. We stay for lunch at Wisley then return to Hampton Court via the rare and award-winning Denbies Vineyard
Saturday, May 26 2012
Check-out from the hotel and make your own way by train to London, by taxi or public transport to Heathrow airport at a time that suits your own travel. We can advise on departure planning.
