Kew - A Gardener's Delight for 300 Years

Handkerchief Tree, Kew Palace, and outside/inside earthly delights (including the rare Jade Vine, from the Philippines)

Kew Gardens, as the Royal Botanic Gardens is known, is an early spring delight. As one guide book says, it "represents the pinnacle of Britain's obsession with gardening." Covering half a square mile and bordered on one side by the Thames, it features a series of elegant Victorian greenhouses, stuffed to the gills with exotic plants, trees, and shrubs from all over the world. In the Waterlily House, lilies that look like small hassocks float along the pond's surface, and the Temperate House has what's called "the Holy Grail" of orchids, with petals measuring some three feet long. While the daffodils had passed their peak, the rhodies, azaleas, and wisteria were in full bloom, and it was a perfect sunny day to stroll through the big swaths of mowed lawns, dodging badger holes and small children.