I had a bit of a disturbed night with Meg being up in the early hours, but she soon settled and she and her sister were up and out at our usual time, no worse for wear. It was another fine morning, 16C wall to wall sunshine. After breakfast with both dogs settled and our dog sitter round to look after Meg & Gracie for the morning, Jen and I headed over to RHS Harlow Carr on the outskirts of Harrogate for the rest of the morning.

We arrived at just after 10.00am and the car park and visitor’s area was quite busy already at this time of the day. We popped in to Betty’s for a coffee before our walk around the gardens. The sun had disappeared behind some low cloud for the time being but after about twenty minutes it had burnt through and stayed with us for the remainder of our visit…

We followed our usual route past the learning centre and teaching gardens, past the little lodge to the Lakeside gardens. It was nice to see that the sunken pond area has been completely re built and redesigned and will look quite spectacular when the planting becomes established around the new walling etc. Continuing along the trail it was good to see the wild orchids thriving amongst the grass verges on the left hand side. After going over the bridge we followed the trail round to the right passing the QM lake,  on the left a lot of work in progress is being carried out in the Southfield adjacent to the lake. 

I always prefer to follow the ‘Streamside walk’, firstly because I have a passion for water and secondly the planting on the banks of the stream is bright, colourful and vibrant and with the sun breaking through the trees makes for a lovely walk. We followed the path to the Old Bath House, stopping several times to take photographs of the lovely views over the stream as well as along the stream. There was an interesting exhibition of photography in the Old Bath House today, with some excellent photographs of wildlife and nature by our local photographers. From here we headed back towards the visitors centre following the path on the other side of the stream up through the Sandstone rock garden. I always like this part of the garden as there are two large size garden ponds either side of the path with some amazing plants and shrubs around them both, I often have to just stand and stare at the beauty of this setting, the tranquillity and peacefulness around the water is quite remarkable. Leaving the Rock Garden behind us we made our way back to the centre and Betty’s restaurant for brunch before the journey home.