The Royal Botanic Gardens are generally referred to as Kew Gardens. The Kew gardens are situated at the western edge of London. Last saturday forecast was bright and sunny and so we decided to visit Kew. The group ( after a lot of ditchings) consisted of me, Divya and Chandra Prakash, hereafter CP.
Kew is well connected to the main city through trains as well as buses. The national rail station at Richmond is 2 minutes by train. Both London Overground as well as District Line goes directly to the Kew station. We decided to meet at Stratford and then switched to Miles End and took the District Line. The overall journey took more than an hour and a half.
A 10 minute walk from the station brought us to Victoria Gate. This gate has a cafe to the extreme right from the ticket counter. The tickets cost 13 GBP and group discounts are available. We availed 2 for one offer. So 26GBP for 3 persons. The ticket for Kew Palace is 5 GBP per person and that for the Kew Explorer is 4GBP. We chose the Palace over the train and that was a mistake. The palace is a WASTE (more on that later).
The staff near the counter checked out tickets and were providing maps. As the area is huge, maps are very handy. They help to choose where and how to go. A few metres from the gate a beautiful lake greets you. The view is quite photogenic and we spent 15- 20 minutes clicking photos. The Glass House with Palm and Aquatic display is right next to the lake. The thick vegetation and tall trees resulted in high heat and humidity and we were sweating within minutes. We ran down to the aquatic display to escape from the heat. Types of Algae dominated the display, it was not as colorful as one would like.
A few minutes to the left is the Lily dispaly. There is large pond at the centre with water lilies and some lotuses (we thought). The place makes for really beautiful photographs. On the way to Alpine Glasshouse there are manicured lawns, beautiful roundabouts and rows of tulips making for excellent pictures. There were some rose family trees in full bloom, totally covered with flowers.
The Alpine display is beautiful in its own right. Flowers are few but the variety of vegetation more than makes up for it. There are various areas depending on the heights and vegetation type. The authorities have made arrangements such that even people on wheelchairs can easily move about. The pagoda is close to Alpne and is worth a visit. You can climb to the top and the view is nice.
On the way to Kew Palace you encounter a small bridge, a small display and a big cafe. It provides food at exorbitant rates. But this is a nice place to rest if you are tired. Map is helpful in finding the way. The palace is a large buiding of ornagish brown color. The person at the gate takes your tickets and hands a pamphlet elaborating the various 'attractions' of the palace. There arent many. The palace is no bigger than a manor and was being renovated at the time of our visit. Some of the paintings are good and are the only saving grace. The Queen's bed is barely three feet wide. Divya and I were debating as to how many times she would fall while sleeping. One of the rooms houses a library. The view of the Queens' Garden is tempting enough to make us visit.The last stop was Rose Garden which we could not locate beause it was dug up for renovation.
In three hours we barely covered third of the garden. Our mistake was not to take the Explorer (train) which would have taken us around the Gardens leaving us more time and less tired. It was later that I came to know that there are free guided walks everyday from the Victoria Gate at 11am and 2pm. Go for these. I resolved to check the website before going anywhere!