Day 5 - The Hunters Marlborough Garden Tour - Garden 1

Day 5 once again dawned a brilliant blue sky, although rather cold in the morning. I love the Blenheim weather. We headed into town to pick up the bus for our Garden Tour. We were to visit 5 gardens. They were all different, but all absolutely spectacular. The work that has gone into these gardens one can only imagine, as they were huge. But what I loved was the variety of flowers and plants that were able to grow. I'm jealous of the Rhododendrens and the Clematis plants, both of these that don't grow well in Auckland..

The first house was owned by the Gibbons in Annandale. Because of my deafness, I only picked up snippets of information at each house, but I'll do my best. It was a perfect morning for photographing - early, sun not too bright and no wind. We were greeted by this garden. The first thing I noticed was the lawn. It was PERFECT. Oh to have lawn like that...



Beautiful tall trees and shadows and light. Further around were all the flowers. On the unopened peonies there were lots of bees laden with dew, and still cold and slow, so I was able to get the shots without a tripod, which is just as well as my tripod was at home in Auckland..



The Rhodendrens were fantastic..



And lots of different colours..



Lots of Irises as well although they are particularly hard to photograph. I got one shot..



The Roses were much better than mine in Auckland. When I came down none of mine were even in flower. At this time of the morning they were covered in dew This one is my favourite...



This one was a close second..



Here's another gorgeous one...



But my favourite of all was the Clematis. I just love it..



Thanks so much for the Gibbons for letting us explore their beautiful garden. It was one of my favourites of the day.

I took many more photos, but becuase of no tripod, not all of them turned out. I also didn't want to bore you all with flower after flower, so am just picking out the best of each garden.