Highgrove, Glorious Garden

I posted about Highgrove once before here

I finally made it there in April.

It was worth the journey.  At least for the winding Cotswolds roads to get there and a red gypsy caravan we saw parked at the side of the road.  The tea and fat scones and clotted cream.  The chickens.  You're not allowed to take pictures within Highgrove but silly me I thought I shouldn't leave my camera in the car park so I didn't bring it at all. (Well the car park is seriously secure because we're talking about Prince Charles' house, are we not!?  So I regret not getting a picture of that gypsy caravan - and the rolling Gloucestershire hills.)  

These pictures were from postcards I bought at the gift shop.  We were too early for the allium, and we were not allowed to walk down the thyme walk in the top picture which was actually, my main goal for the visit.  There are other attractions....the house itself (exterior only), it's expansive views over the countryside and a steeple in I think, Tetbury.  The tree house that the young Princes, Wills and Harry, have played in, the hellebores, the walled garden. But the visit is not cheap, it books up early in the year.  Tickets go on sale in March or April (the website will tell you exactly what day that booking will start for the year).  I would book for mid-summer next time.  

It is not a horticulturist's garden - you will have seen most of the plants before if you are a bit of a plants person.  And for my tastes there was a bit too much emphasis on garden ornaments - the Prince IS given a lot of gifts by various and sundry parties and I guess it's polite to put them in his garden.  The best part is that it is an entirely sustainably cultivated, organic garden and you have never seen such healthy plants!  So you will have to be impressed and inspired.

If you are a fan of Prince Charles, and a bit of a royalist, you will also have to pinch yourself a time or two when you consider whose feet have preceded yours on those green and pleasant paths!