Visit to Ramster Garden

(Click on photos to enlarge)

The destination for our May visit, Ramster Garden near Chiddingfold, kept open especially for our early evening visit, proved a delight to walk around, with its many areas and vistas, nearly always against a background of different coloured rhododendrons and azaleas.

The Japanese influence was evident from the bamboo clumps, the snowball hydrangea and the (very) prickly castor oil tree, the cranes sculpture in the ponds, and the Japanese Bridge, and was a speciality of Gauntletts, the nurseries who designed the original garden for Sir Henry Waechter in 1900.

Although quite compact, the different sections, including wild flower areas with numerous spotted orchids, the ponds, the bog garden with its spectacular flowering guneras and the (steep) woodland walk  gave the impression of a much larger garden.

The photo gallery on the Ramster website, www.ramsterevents.com is well worth viewing. The garden is open to the public in Spring (until 10th June) and Autumn only, with a Tea House and Plant Sales near the entrance.