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Some sort of big bromeliad flower-spike
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I think I've left you wondering at my choice of books, telly and music for long enough, so here are the promised photos from last Thursday's visit - my third - to the Old Vicarage Gardens at East Ruston. (The first and second visits can be found here and here.)
As that feeling of dread and despair is telling you, yes, this is a VERY photo-heavy post. I almost didn't do it as I could barely be bothered to choose the photos and then resize them all (not to mention smush some of the flower photos together so as not to really go overboard with images...). Almost...
Anyway, let's get on with it, shall we? The sooner we start, the sooner it'll be over and you can return to your knitting/day-time drinking/uphill gardening (delete as appropriate).
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Foxgloves for me...
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... and Fuchsias for Jon. This one has grown into a small tree.
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It's so tall that even I have to look up to see up its skirts!
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Tree fern (Dicksonia antarctica or somesuch)
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As I walked around, I kept smelling the heavenly scent of honeysuckle, but I could never see any - Because it was the scent of the Cabbage palm (Cordyline australis)
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The Woodland Garden opened out to this lawned area
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Some sort of ornamental rhubarb (Rheum palmatum or something)
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The Exotic Garden pergola
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And the Exotic Garden itself
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Close up of the lily pond
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These Rice Paper trees (Tetrapanax papyrifera) towered over everything else around the Exotic Garden
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Looking into the Rose Garden - which smelled heavenly!
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The view from the other side.
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These little rock gardens in stone troughs are dotted around the Rose Garden
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The Rose Garden pergola
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Entering the Desert Wash
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Another striking bromeliad flower
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Plenty of Yuccas, palms and Echiums give the Desert Wash some height
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You can just about make out the flower spike of that bromeliad at the start of this post
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Some rather dainty foxgloves
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This leads down past some animal enclosures to a wildlife pond
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The Fruit Cage and surrounding gardens
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Foxgloves galore!
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Guinea fowl
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Llamas or alpacas or something equally unamused-looking
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The Diamond Jubilee Walled Garden
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Wildflower meadow
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Horsetail reeds near the entrance/exit
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☙❧
And now for some close-ups:
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Stinking iris (Iris foetidissima), those tree fuchsias, Arum lily (Zantedeschia aethiopica), and Blue Flag (Iris versicolor)
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Magnolia, Angels Trumpets (Brugmansia), waterlily, and a spent but quite fascinating Magnolia
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Some sort of exotic-looking pine cone (from the Exotic Garden funnily enough), bromeliad, Dragon arum (Dracunculus vulgaris), and some sort of thistley-type thing
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Roses, of course
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More roses
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Irises & roses, I'm not sure what the fuchsia-pink thing is(?), Fuchsia "Blackie" I believe, and sweetpeas
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Peonies at the top, an intentionally ragged opium poppy, and finally a variety of passionflower
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There. That's it. Although, next I think I'll do a Garden Photos Event reminder...?
This is my porn!
ReplyDeleteNow I really want to visit this place called Norfolk! Love the Fuchsia flowers, so delicate and beautiful structure.
Those are Llamas. A proper Llama greeting involves being nose to nose and giving a gentle blow of air out the nostrils. (Not hard enough to blow snot on each other, that's an aggressive act of trying to establish dominance over the other.)
My other stimulant, I'm only a lurker, https://www.deviantart.com/
I didn't go near the llamas - not for fear of snot-blowing (although: yuk!), but because there were people at the fence (just out of shot) near where the llamas were hanging around looking bored. Instead, I wandered off an found my into the Diamond Jubilee Walled Garden.
DeleteDeviantArt, too?!
Oh. Wow! That garden looks fabulous - and such an array of flowers...
ReplyDeleteThe "tree Fuchsia" is, I believe, "Hawkshead", and the dangly "fuchsia-pink thing" in the last-but-one montage is probably a Dierama.
As for that remarkable bromeliad - it's a Puya. One member of that plant family is known as the ‘sheep eating plant’ as it traps sheep in its sharp spikes. They die and decay and the plant feeds off the decay.
I love all those roses - one looks remarkably like our own "Velichenblau" - and that passion flower in the final batch is just incredible (if that is a full-size grown-up hand behind it, of course, rather than a child's...). And who knew that Cordyline flowers even had a scent, let alone of honeysuckle?!
Like so many gorgeous gardens we've seen (not least courtesy of Carol Klein's latest Channel 5 series), we'd love to go, but they're always in remote places miles away from anywhere accessible via public transport... Jx
Ah! Dierama - yes, thank you. Funnily enough, I just noticed that a house a few doors down as one in their front garden. They don't have a Puya, though. Probably for the best...
DeleteThat passion flower really was stunning (and that's my bigger than full-size grown-up hand supporting it). It was growing in one of the conservatories so it had been spared the cold that everything else has had to put up with.
If you ever do fancy a day trip to Norfolk, I could probably persuade Car to make a trip out to Norwich station to ferry you about as public transport (where it exists around here) is rather hit and miss...
Truly exquisite - a word I do not toss about. Both the garden and your photo gallery. You've quite the eye (and a great camera), for you've captured so much of the beauty. We have a rose garden here, in Minneapolis, and it is lovely, but not as elaborate or nearly as breathtaking. Thank you for taking the time and effort to share all this splendor with us. Kizzes.
ReplyDeleteWhy, thank you! Camera has served me well, and is mostly quite well behaved. Mostly.
DeleteI hope you're taking photos of your gardening efforts for the Big Event later in the year? (Which is not a contest, so anything goes)
I didn't know you could get ornamental rhubarb. What a good idea! Much better than the notionally edible type.
ReplyDeleteI sent you my picture of me gardening, but please use the second one with the glamorous lady.
I grow rhubarb up at the allotment, but I think any beneficial vitamins and fibre it may impart are far outweighed by the amount of sugar and crumble-mix required to make it edible!
DeleteOh, in that second picture you look divine! I can't believe you make such an effort when digging in (to) manure... (and thanks for the prompt to check my emails!)
Blimey, I feel like I accidentally picked up a gardening magazine! Very exotic, Mr Devine!
ReplyDeleteWhere are the gnomes?
Sx
I think any gnomes would be kicked out of The Old Vicarage Garden. Although, I did spy a cement old boot with aloes growing out of it, so perhaps there were some gnomes lurking about after all?
DeleteDoes it have a tea room?
ReplyDeleteIf you are looking for an exotic alternative to the foxglove try growing sesame seed.
A garden owned by a couple of poofs? Of course it has a tea room. The cafe is reasonable, too...
DeleteI have just searched for sesame plant, and the resemblance to foxglove flowers is quite striking. You know I'm going to have to try and grow some now, don't you? Although, maybe next year as I suspect it's a little late in the year now.
This is like going to Longwood Gardens here!!!! I loved all the close ups!
ReplyDeleteBefore taking those close-ups, I said to the flowers "Just think of a Pam Demic pose"!
DeleteOh! My kind of garden.
ReplyDeleteJon is right about the Dierama. And the Cabbage Tree is known to Maori as ti kouka and all stem, root and leaves are edible and can be used medicinally. I've tried young leaves; I'd say old growth would be pretty unchewable!
Also, when First Nations gets here she's going to going head-over-heels in love with this!
I should think that even Richard Kiel's 'Jaws' would have difficulty with old cabbage tree growth!
DeleteI'd love to be on a garden tour with you, Ms Nations, Jon & Madam A, and everyone really!
Right! First order is to get this bloody Covid thing squared away then we can all fly to Heathrow, get the Victoria Line (memory is foggy..) tube into London, then onto the ...um...tube that goes to Liverpool Street (some plonker will probably end up in beatleland!), grab a train to Norwich ....where you'll be waiting with Car. OOh! I'm excited already...
DeleteSplendid! Although, it'll be rather a tight squeeze trying to fit all of us into Car.
Delete* ponders tow-hook and trailer option *
I think you should be aware your email has been hacked. Someone just sent me an email from it!
ReplyDeleteHa ha haa!
DeleteGosh what a wonderful garden.
ReplyDeleteAs I was reading I kept thinking it looked familiar and so it is. It was featured in BBC's Glorious Gardens from Above. 17 November 2014
I think you managed to show us more detail than Christine Walkden did.
'Bloomin Marvelous'
Deletehttps://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02c4qjl
Blimey! Christine's a bit of a personality, isn't she?!
DeleteThere's loads I didn't capture with Camera, so a return visit is on the cards later in the Summer!
Have you apprenticed to Monty Don now, sweetpea? xoxo
ReplyDeleteI'd never get anything done, dear Savvy. I'd be too busy making a fuss of and playing with his dogs!
Delete