I had booked tickets some time ago to visit the Harrogate Spring Flower show today at the showground on the outskirts of Harrogate. This show tends to be the first major event in the UK gardening year and runs till Sunday afternoon.

It was a pleasant, dry, cool morning, 3C whilst I was out with the dogs earlier today.

After breakfast we set off for the 45-minute drive up the A1 motorway to the showground. The traffic was quite light and car parking was well signposted and directed us off the main road and around the back of the ‘Rudding Park hotel’ across several fields to the showground car park. We arrived about 10.15am and after a short but well organised queue entered the show a few minutes later.

The sun was shining, and the light breeze made it quite pleasant for walking and browsing amongst the stalls. I was surprised by the large number of visitors at the show at this time in the morning. After a few moments of looking at fancy hot tubs and garden ornaments, we headed into the ‘nursery pavilion’ for a cup of tea and bacon sandwich, after which we continued looking at all the plant stalls and displays inside the pavilion.

The displays by the plant nurseries were outstanding and we spent many minutes admiring the Cacti and Bonsai displays, as well as the displays of Lilly’s, Orchids and Tulips. On leaving the ‘nursery pavilion’ we continued walking amongst all the trade stands, they were selling just about everything you could imagine for the home and garden. If you were looking for inspiration in your own garden, then this show is certainly worth a visit. Some of the garden ornaments and decorations were amazing, lots of wooden and metal moulded animals, life size animals of every kind imaginable from Sea lions to Deer and Lions to Elephants, I’m not certain if I would have one in our garden, but they certainly made a statement. I do not know how we would have got one of the big Deer, let alone a Giraffe home had we decided to purchase one!!

We headed onwards and into one of the tented areas to look at the floral displays on show, many of them were works of art, the time and patience involved in creating them was unthinkable, all very skilfully constructed which made quite an impact on the eye. On leaving the display marquee we headed over to the bandstand for a sit down and listen to the musicians whilst enjoying an ice-cream in the afternoon sunshine. After finishing our little treat, we headed over to have a look at the six small display gardens before continuing our walk amongst all the trade stands. I had lost all track of time being engrossed with everything that was going on around us and in next to no time it was mid-afternoon so at that point decided to head for home before the rush to the exit started, as it turns out there was no need to worry as everything was well signposted and we were soon back on the main road and heading for home.

A very enjoyable day and I am already looking forward to the Autumn flower show at Newby Hall on the 16^th – 18^th September.