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CLASSIC CARIBBEAN with Will Giles

3 March 2011 - 14 night Cruise aboard Braemar

Nevis Botanical Garden

In November of 2010 Will Giles and Matthew Biggs hosted a cruise for cruise.co.uk with 80 avid ‘Gardeners' World’ Magazine readers around the Caribbean.  A fabulous time was had by all and so much so that Will has recorded their journey in his blog blog which you can follow on http://www.exoticgarden.com/blog/the-garden/thinking-of-warm-seas-and-deepest-blue-sky

Matthew Biggs trying to work out his new camera!

It's a fascinating read and as one of the gardens that they visited on their cruise, features in Will's next cruise that he's hosting in March, we thought we'd share his experiences with you:

"Botanically speaking, two gardens and one nursery stood out above the others for Matt and me, both of us being tropical plantaholicks! The first being ‘Nevis Botanical Gardens’ on the small island of Nevis, a forty five minute boat ride from its larger cousin St Kitts. The second, an emporium of delight named ‘St. Rose Nursery of Exotic Plants’ in the heart of Grenada, and lastly the stunningly beautiful ‘Hunte’s Gardens’ in the highlands of Barbados. The two gardens were new to us and very exciting for such jaded garden visitors who yearned for something new.

We had been to ‘St. Rose Nursery of Exotic Plants’ several times before but a return visit is always de rigueur as it is like walking into a sweet shop of exotic species and cultivars of the strangest plants that never disappoints. There are of course many other gardens, botanical gardens and nurseries we visited that were fabulous for different reasons, but time dictates that I can only describe three over several blogs which will hopefully stave off some of the winter blues us Brits have to suffer, and besides, there isn’t an awful lot to see in my garden at this time of year anyway, unless you want picture of icicles and shivering cats!

The ‘Nevis Botanical Gardens’ at the top end of a chain of islands on the eastern side of the Caribbean. To visit you have to catch a two decked passenger boat that regularly shuttles back and forth between the sea front close to Basseterre the capital of St Kitts and Charlestown the small capital of Nevis. Both islands have dormant volcanoes at their centres that on the day we travelled over had their peaks shrouded in white puffy clouds surrounded by the bluest of sky’s and a hot tropical sun beating down upon us as we sped along.

On arrival at the small dock we transferred to a local bus as part of a tour arranged by our cruise ship to the gardens – we then travelled about twenty or so minutes down tiny roads to the entrance. Unfortunately on this tour we were only given just under one hour to visit the whole garden – a ridiculously short time if you want to meander slowly taking in all the delights of a garden you have never seen before! We had no idea what the garden was going to be like as we arrived in the car park near the entrance.

The entrance itself was quite grand with two chunky square columns with their imposing gates flung open, topped with traditional urns overflowing with constrained Alcantarea imperialis – bromeliads that in the wild can reach exceedingly large proportions with towering flower spikes. At the base of each column, large clumps of one of my favourite bromeliads Aechmea blanchetiana in shades of intense burnt yellowy-orange revel in the partial shade of some larger trees close by. Two rather fierce looking oriental stone dragons guard the whole edifice, and guide your eyes down a central driveway lined with tall billowing palms.

From here on you are led towards a large lawn with a rather grand white Victorian building surrounded by a covered balcony standing out proudly against the deep blue Caribbean sky. From here the botanical garden spreads into a labyrinth of smaller gardens and borders. Behind the house there is an extraordinary if not incongruous formal garden consisting of raised stone beds with topiary bushes, some tiered, surrounded with a geometric planting of Bromeliads in blocks of yellow and purplish red Neoregelias. In fact I’m not sure if I liked or hated it, though in hindsight, however incongruous, it had a strange and intriguing charm in its echoes of colonial formality!"

This is just a taster of Will's photos and blog and we'd recommend you read more. 

Thankfully the Nevis Botanical Garden Tour which we've organised for the group in March will have at least 2 hours at the garden.  Plenty of time for you to wander at your leisure. 

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