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South Island garden tour; Garden themed travel
Topic Started: Feb 4 2017, 10:29 AM (852 Views)
sooty
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Kahu, thanks for the photos and links.
You will be busy over this holiday.
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sooty
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WARNING: I didn't condense it. Be tempted to visit New Zealand.
Day 3 South Island Garden Tour
OK it's been a massive day. I'm torn between giving the formal story of each of the three Gardens visited plus my personal thoughts or trying to condense beauty, artistry and vision into three paragraphs. Ramble on, Sooty, you say BUT there was so much. I'm about to go to dinner and may succumb to alcohol to help with the decision. The herbal tea just didn't cut it.
We headed out this morning for a short city tour before driving through the tunnel to Port Lyttleton and Governors Bay. This area was formed long ago when a volcano imploded and the sea rushed in. The winding road clung to the hillside and little bays were visible below and across the water.
The first garden- Ohinetahi - Garden of International Significance
A garden was first made on this site in 1865 by T.H.Potts, New Zealand's first botanist. Potts planted a great variety of exotic trees and shrubs, many of which still stand on the perimeter of the garden.He died in 1888 and thereafter the garden fell into dis-repair.
Sir Miles Warren and Mr and Mrs Trengrove restored the house and began the present garden in 1977. Designed by two architects and an artist, the garden inevitably has a strong frame. The formal garden consists of a number of separate garden rooms of differing style and character arranged about two axis, one running east west and another north south.
On the side of the house there is a formal lawn with curved macrocarpa hedges at the end balanced by a pool and poolhouse at the opposite end. There is a rose garden enclosed in box hedges, traditional double herbaceous borders leading to a gazebo, a square walled garden planted in colours of red and green, and a walk of pleached hornbeams on stilts leading up to an oval lawn encircled with a hornbeam hedge.
Steps lead down to a woodland garden shaded by Pott's original trees with a stream flowing down to the harbour. It is densely planted with rhododendrons, camellias and a good variety of New Zealand native plants. A swing bridge extends the cross axis to a bush walk.
The garden is accented by architectural fragments and modern sculpture.
Best memories : espaliered red Japonica, red peonies, scented climbing roses, poppies galore, sculpture including sundials of various design, the native bush land walk, meeting the owner Sir Miles.
Down the steep and winding road with lots of hairpin bends we headed back to Christchurch for lunch and another garden tour.
The Christchurch Botanic Gardens were founded in 1863 with the planting of an English oak tree. Over the years natural wetlands and sand dunes have been transformed into an elegantly cultivated 21 hectare park with more than 10 different gardens framed by mature trees and expansive lawns, which are mostly contained within a loop of the Avon River.
Formal annual bedding displays, the archery lawn , rose gardens. The Gardens have mature trees in lawns and avenues, Beech, Chestnut, Oak, Cedar, Redwood, Linden, Hawthorn. For much of the year, the collection of modern and cultivar roses make this a colourful and fragrant place. Adjacent to the rose garden is the New Zealand garden, which provides an introduction to native species. The conservatory complex displays everything from cacti and succulents to tropical orchids and carnivorous plants.
Best memories: glasshouses with superb orchids and Bromeliads; Linden trees with new green Spring leaves; many colours of Hawthorn blossom; the rose garden in bud with the entrance arch in flower; vivid colours of the annuals; almost black dark tulips bedded with white phlox; blue Chatham Island 'forget me nots'.
Now south to Broadfield NZ Landscape Garden - Garden of National Significance
Broadfield Garden is about 3.5 hectares and has been established for 20 years. It aims for excellence in design, planting and maintenance. Originality is a priority. Many natives are used formally and informally as are NZ raised varieties of Azaleas, Rhododendrons, Camellias, Cherry Cornus, Maples, Peony Perennials, Daffodils, Lily, and Roses.
It includes a Kauri forest with over 100+ trees and 100+ species of other Kauri forest trees, shrubs, climbers and ferns. Also a large beech forest, viewing mound, 120 m NZ border, a 140 m canal, sedge pond, formal rose garden, cricket oval and more. All framed in 1.5 km of totara hedges.
Best memories : the colours of Rhododendrons and Camelias; the viewing mound like a large cone and the track led round and round to the top for some spectacular views over the property; cypress hedges as wind breaks 15 metre high; the formal ponds stretching as for as the eye could see; having the owner and gardener as guide and share his passion for converting pasture to this masterpiece with us.
Summary: exhausted, overwhelmed. ( I'm sure you all will be too if you have read this!)
Temp 18C Costs $10 book $13mc food .Steps 14,400

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Kahu
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A little further info ... Ohinetahi trans [She is the lady] on Banks Peninsula.
Ohinetahi Garden

Sir Miles Warren and the rebuild of Christ's Church Cathedral

Miles: A life in architecture
Celebrating the achievements of leading New Zealand architect Sir Miles Warren

Best known for the Christchurch Town Hall and Wellington's Michael Fowler Centre, Sir Miles Warren is the doyen of post-war New Zealand architecture, the first New Zealander to be knighted for services to architecture, an Icon of the Arts Foundation of New Zealand, and a leading figure in the arts in Christchurch. The garden at his Governors Bay home, Ohinetahi, beautifully crafted by Miles with his sister Pauline Trengrove and her husband John, has also secured for him a reputation as one of our most remarkable garden designers.

Source Link

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agate
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Lovely read sooty.

So very tempting but alas mobility & budget will not allow. You are doing a good job of making me see it. Thanks
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sooty
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Day 4 South Island Garden Tour
Christchurch to Dunedin
Got the message loud and clear from my Aussie friends that yesterday was over the top. Will be more succinct today and not cut and paste such detail. The name of the garden will let you google it.
Early start to Ashburton and the Trotts Garden - a garden of national significance. Planted on raw pasture and level ground (7 acres), it has been a labour of love, hard work and pride for the owner, Alan. Rare trees surround the various garden rooms, each protected by hedges from the north westerly winds.
My highlights: -the perennial garden, cut to the ground each winter and regenerates.
- the silver birches and hosta of the wet garden
- The knot gardens, world class
- The red garden of flowers, plants and trees of red
- Rhododendron, Camelias and Magnolias galore
- A photo of tree reflections in the lake
The tour was by the designer and creator. Naturally he was proud of his achievements but it was almost " God calls him, GOD ". We lesser mortals were privileged to see his masterpieces. The gardens were beautiful but a bit of humility never goes astray. He knew all the Latin names and told you so.
Continuing south across the Canterbury Plains it was mainly dairy farms with some sheep, cattle and crops further south. Huge farms under irrigation for productivity. Several shale/ pebbly rivers, the bridge over one was one mile long and ice blue water, quite shallow but fast flowing.
We had the snow capped mountains to our right as we stopped in Timaru for lunch. An old port town with bright and vivid municipal gardens and street plantings. Sopheze Coffee shop did a mean toasted vegetarian sandwich. NZ boast was that Phar Lap first raced here. Honestly those Kiwis try to steal all our icons.
We followed the coast to Oamaru. Oamaru had its heyday in the late 1800s with grain and wool prices making it a wealthy city. The local stone, limestone based, was used in many of the ornate Victorian buildings. The Anglican Church on the hill rivalled a cathedral. The old bank buildings, customs house, wool store etc made a small precinct that we wandered around. Driving south of the town we entered an avenue of memorial oak trees, each named for a fallen Otago soldier of WW1.
The road became hilly with a lot of forestry and swathes of native trees and vegetation. Two huge hills to climb , glad I wasn't driving the coach and we crested to see Dunedin , on the harbour and nestled in the hills. Dunedin was settled as a Presbyterian colony, as Christchurch by the Church of England. It's the Edinburgh of the South. A short orientation tour , lovely old buildings of the university and churches, Speights brewery and finally our hotel for two nights.
Temp 17C steps 10,200 costs lunch $7 mc icy pole $4 card $1.
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Kahu
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sooty
Oct 29 2017, 06:00 AM
NZ boast was that Phar Lap first raced here. Honestly those Kiwis try to steal all our icons.
Posted Image
Phar Lap 1931 ... Hugh Telford's Stables, Trentham

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Racehorse Phar Lap, with handler/jockey Reginald James Mackie, at Hugh Telfords stables, Trentham, Upper Hutt

One bright spot in the years of the Great Depression darkness ... Phar Lap ... Phar Lap died in strange and still unexplained circumstances in the United States in 1932. To Depression era dreamers, he was a sort of Everyhorse: New Zealand-born, Sydney-raised, Melbourne achiever.
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Trotsky
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FuzzyO
Oct 27 2017, 01:46 PM
How fortunate to have a widow who sculpts!
Sooty I am enoying your descriptions very much.
Nobody with a widow can be called fortunate.
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FuzzyO
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For that matter nobody can have their own widow I guess!
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Trotsky
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Big City Boy
No argument.
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sooty
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Day 5 South Island Garden Tour
Dunedin and surrounds
I was up early and went for a short walk around the hotel precinct. The buildings ranged from Art Deco to Victorian and Georgian facades. Street art included the Cargill memorial water fountain ( ornate Victorian) , the Soldier's Memorial and the Millennium Cross,both in Queens Gardens and some cute modern bronzes of penguins.
Breakfast, then off to the Otago Peninsula and Larnach Castle and Gardens. The road, winding and steep , was covered in fog and Kiwis don't have many guard rails.
We toured the Castle ( really an ornate home built by a business man in 1870). Superb ceilings, wooden carving and panelling. Views over the Peninsula and to Chalmers Bay. He lived here with three successive wives until he took his own life. What a summary! The house was gutted and sold. The current owners took a ruin in 1967 and have recreated the home's elegance and restored the gardens. The owner took us on a tour of the gardens and explained her knowledge of the garden. In clearing old second growth, the bones of the original garden were discovered. They have made changes to open up new vistas.
My favourites : -a laburnum grove with framed views to Port Chalmers;
-the lost rock garden with Alpine plants from around the world;
-the south seas garden with plants, trees and grasses from the Pacific region.
The whole estate was surrounded with huge old pines and Cyprus for wind protection.
For children there was an Alice in Wonderland theme and I spotted the Cheshire Cat , high in a tree overlooking the house.
Returning to Dunedin we had an all too short visit to the Botanic Gardens. In the time frame given I had to be selective of which areas to visit. I chose the arboretum , particularly the Cedars of Lebanon walk. Some of these trees were over 150 years old. My other choice was the rock garden on the edge of Lindsay Creek. The path zigged and zagged down to the creek. In hindsight both choices had paths defined as hard, steep steps, loose surface but I went very slowly and carefully. After all that work I deserved my picnic lunch, sitting on a stone seat under a giant sequoia.
Then it was off to the Dunedin Railway Station, a most ornate Victorian building with superb Royal Doulton tiles lining the walls of the entrance hall. Our group took a two hour seaside trip around the bay to Waitati and back on the Seasider. Spectacular views of the harbour, steep coastline, Port Chalmers and Purakauni. An excellent commentary of the sights and history, European and Maori.
Tonight was a Scottish themed dinner in keeping with Dunedin's history. The piper led us. Haggis was palatable and sample Whisky bottle I'll have on my porridge tomorrow. I don't count this as alcohol on my dry holiday. It would have been discourteous to refuse the gift.
Temperature 20C a heatwave for Dunedin . Hotel has heating but only a fan for cooling. Costs lunch $10 mc steps 12,000
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erka
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Sooty: Your travelogues are interesting and peaked my interest to find more about your destinations. Here is a link to Larnach Castle - the Barker family restored the castle and gardens in keeping to its original magnficence.

http://www.larnachcastle.co.nz/Home
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Kahu
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Dunedin, during our gold rush years 1860 - 1890, was the premier city of NZ with all the Banks and businesses headquartered there. (Hence all the grand buildings) Auckland was the capital from the time of the Treaty, but politicians travel from one end of the country to the other was both long and perilous. There was a great argument and the politicians refused to travel ... they relented when the capital was moved south to Wellington (half-way) between Dunedin and Auckland. Wellington's motto is 'Suprema a situ' ... loosely translated as 'We've got the best possie!'

Posted Image
Dunedin Railway Station

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The Royal Doulton tiled interior of the station

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Central tile in the foyer

Posted Image
The long platforms are now used as catwalks for International Fashion shows
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sooty
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Thanks Erka and Kahy,
Certainly better photos than I got on the IPad .
By the way, where is the cold weather I brought a Spenser and leggings for? Am melting in Invercargill and have just ordered a fan from reception.
Needed that Whisky to cool me down and may go to dinner in scuffs rather than my boots.
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Kahu
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sooty
Oct 30 2017, 06:12 PM
Thanks Erka and Kahu,
Certainly better photos than I got on the IPad .
By the way, where is the cold weather I brought a Spenser and leggings for? Am melting in Invercargill and have just ordered a fan from reception.
Needed that Whisky to cool me down and may go to dinner in scuffs rather than my boots.
Sorry, blame me, at the time I was sure the weather would be absolute rubbish. However, now it's the foehn effect. The NW wind crossing the Tasman rises over the Alps and warms up crossing the land towards the SE.
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agate
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Beautiful.
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