The outing

Last Wednesday the gardeners and volunteers travelled to The Sir Harold Hillier Gardens near Romsey, Hampshire. This was a day-trip to celebrate and reward all the hard work and dedication they have shown to the gardens over the years, working to ensure the restoration and future development continues at pace.

We were also going to visit Nereida, our Historical and Botanical Garden Bursary Scheme Trainee Gardener from last year. We surprised Nereida and presented her with a book which highlighted her year in the garden. Nereida started at Hillier’s as a Gardener in September 2011 following a year training at Myddelton. Nereida is working in Magnolia Avenue, an area of the garden in front of Jermyn's House.

The presentation of the book

David Jewell, Head of Collections, gave us a tour of the gardens. It was most entertaining and enjoyable. We didn’t arrive back at Myddelton until 7pm.

David Jewell

For information on The Sir Harold Hillier Gardens
http://www3.hants.gov.uk/hilliergardens

When we arrived back at Myddelton all the gardeners went to close the glasshouses and put the chickens to bed. We all congregated at the rapidly-developing glasshouse to see what progress had been made while we were away.

This was the progress that we were presented with (by torch light).


The autumnal tints were a blaze of colour, one particular beauty was Enkianthus perulatus