4-day/3-night tour in ENGLAND, May 12-15, 2014. Highlights: Tour with garden historian Marion Mako/Hidcote Manor Gardens/white rambling roses at Kiftsgate/H.R.H. the Prince of Wales’ garden at Highgrove. Land, £760 (near $1,181) for Village Pub accommodations (single supp., £210); £1,135 ($1,764) for Barnsley House (single supp., £561). World Walks (Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England; phone [44] [0] 1242 254 353).
The flower market in Hong Kong is a great place to visit. Located near the Prince Edward MTR (metro) station in the city’s Mongkok section (served by both the green and red lines), one whole street as well as side streets are lined with flower shops.
Bon-n-n-n-g! A sonorous brass gong announced my arrival.
It certainly made me feel important, and I’d not even come for an overnight stay at what may well be Yangon’s most luxurious hotel: The Governor’s Residence, an Orient-Express Hotels property.
13 days / 12 nights, Jan. 18-28, 2014. Highlights: Little Brenthurst Garden in Johannesburg / Cape Town’s Kirstenbosch Botanical Garden with 8,000 species / chacma baboons in Cape Point Nature Reserve / Robben Island / Stellenbosch / rose garden, white garden at Vergelegen Estate / Big five in Pilanesberg National Park. From Atlanta, $5,795. Single supp., $995. Earthbound Expeditions (Bainbridge Island, WA; 800 / 723-8454).
In Brussels, Belgium, in even-numbered years, the Grand ’Place is covered with 2,000 square meters of flowers (the next “Flower Carpet” is Aug. 14-17, 2014). A new event, Floraliëntime, now will take place there in odd-numbered years.
During Floraliëntime 2013 (Aug. 15-18), several rooms in the City Hall, itself, will be transformed into a garden, with more than 100,000 flowers arranged by renowned landscape architects. The Grand ’Place will have a relaxation garden.
The eighth annual International Garden Show Hamburg is taking place April 26-Oct. 13, 2013, on a 200-acre site in Wilhelmsburg, a 10-minute train ride from Hamburg*, Germany. The 3-mile main route of the show winds through six themed regions, such as World of Water, World of Nature and World of Religion.
A 2-hour guided tour of the show takes place at 10 and 11 a.m. each day and costs €4 ($5.30). The show is open 9 a.m. until dusk. Admission, €21 ($27).
It was February 16, 1990. Only the tops of palm trees gave a hint of what might lay beneath. Workmen began to chop away with machetes at monstrous blankets of undergrowth, a 70-year accumulation of fallen trees, brambles, ivy and once-tidy boxwood hedges grown rampant into high, impenetrable walls.
Completely obliterated under the accumulated debris were acres of gardens laid out on land that came into ownership of the Tremayne family in the 1700s.
A 3½-hour ride from Seoul, South Korea, via bullet train ($36 each way), the International Garden Exposition in Suncheon Bay runs until Oct. 20, 2013. It will include indoor gardens, urban gardens, herb gardens, forest paths and exhibits on ecology and wetland management.
Open 9 a.m.-5 p.m. weekdays and 9-7 weekends. Tickets cost KRW15,000 (near $14) and can be purchased in advance (phone +82 61 749 2851 3 or online). The expo site is a 10-minute bus ride from the rail station.
Fifty miles from San José, Costa Rica, is the Butterfly & Frog Garden, a 2,150-square-foot, open-air garden in the 12,000-acre park Rain Forest Adventures Costa Rica Atlantic (office at SW Third Ave., Ste. 200, Miami, FL 33129; 866/759-8726 or 305/704-3350).
Visitors will find blue morpho butterflies and blue jeans frogs, red-eyed frogs and black-and-green frogs. A bilingual naturalist answers questions. Garden entry costs $10.
