Botanical gardens Archives ⋆ The Passenger

July 3, 2024August 4, 2024

Otherworldly

If you arrive on Vancouver Island via Swartz Bay, plan a stop at the Butchart Gardens while being on your way to Victoria. When I imagine the inside of the rabbit hole in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland this is the place that comes most close to it. The private garden was created by Jennie Butchart in 1904 in a quarry that her husbands business had caused. You can stroll the sunken garden, a beautiful Japanese garden, a rose garden and sections focused on Italy and the Mediterranean flora.

July 2, 2024August 3, 2024

VanDusen

Since 1975 the city of Vancouver has a nice botanical garden in Shaughnessy, south of downtown. It is a beautiful garden with fantastic flowers, rivers, lakes and an Elizabethan maze to get lost in. The garden doesn’t do scientific research, it just exhibits plants in differently themed areas. There is a stone garden, a vegetable garden, giant sequoias, sino-himalayan plants and areas for the flora of Chile, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. In one section you’ll find collections of azaleas, rhododendrons and camellias; in another firs, maples, conifers, lindens, cypresses and cedars can be found.

May 12, 2024June 27, 2024

Kew Gardens

After some days at the city center of London you might probably want to get a little bit outside of the city and relax in a green environment. The perfect place for that are the Royal Botanic Gardens or Kew Gardens at Richmond; a city quarter in the West. It is a UNESCO world heritage site dating back to the year 1638 CE and exhibiting plants from all parts of the world next to Victorian-era greenhouses and vast gardens that give you a quiet and peaceful place to sit down, relax and maybe read a book.

October 2, 2023November 11, 2023

Inside the gorge

The botanical garden of თბილისი is vast in size but unlike typical botanical gardens in western Europe packed with flowers and trees. It is more like a large park with different smaller sections of flowers, a Japanese garden, a waterfall and endless rows of cypress trees. What makes it so special is the location: it can be found within a gorge behind the mountain on which Kartlis deda monument and the Nariqala fortress are standing.

July 9, 2023July 23, 2023

Flower power

There is nothing better than a botanical garden if you want to rest a little bit. And the botanical garden of Akureyri is a very good example for that: it has wonderful flowers, can be entered free of charge and there is even a coffee bar (the Laut) in the center of the garden. You can discover 400 local plants and 6,000 plants from all over the world (from polar regions and high mountains) in the garden.

January 21, 2023January 22, 2023

Palmengarten

Close to the city center of Frankfurt am Main you’ll find a pleasure rather unexpected in this central location: the Palmengarten, a botanical garden between high modern houses and ancient homes. It is 22 hectares large and was opened in 1871. The garden expert Heinrich Siesmayer received the order to buy the trees and plants of the orangery of Adolphe, the Duke of Nassau. The garden was created following the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont and the buildings of the World Exhibition of 1867 in Paris. Some elements of that can be seen still today.

May 27, 2022June 3, 2022

Scientific rose garden

Botanical gardens in eastern Europe often suffer the lack of funding and rather look vast gardens. At the center of София you can find a well-maintained botanical garden belonging to the university – it is rather small in size but a wonderful place the recover from the hustle-and-bustle on the streets. It can be found next to the Alexander-Newski-Cathedral and the National Gallery.

April 16, 2022April 26, 2022

Botanique

If you want to enjoy a full-scale botanical garden close to the Belgian capital you must go to the Plantentuin in Meise, just three kilometers north of the Atomium. If you can live with a smaller one, the old Jardin Botanique (Kruidtuin) north of the city center is waiting for your visit. It was opened in 1829 and consisted of an orangery, three terraces (in French, Italian and English styles) and was decorated with fifty-two statues.

October 28, 2021January 19, 2022

Secret pond

The Akámas peninsula is the northwestern end of Cyprus is covered by beautiful nature and protected as a national park. You can best discover it by hiking. In the last years, many people switched to renting quads and disturb the peace and quietness of this are. An alternative is to discover the northern shore by car and a lot of visitors decide to visit the Baths of Aphrodite there.

September 29, 2021December 21, 2021

Grădina Botanică

If you get to the botanical garden of București and rate it with a western European scale in mind, you might be disappointed. In large parts it rather looks like a public park than a botanical garden. The vast Grădina Botanică was created in 1884 and was partially destroyed in both World Wars.