Ventnor

Having missed out on Ventnor Botanic Gardens last year, with the last visit seeming to have been in 2017, as recorded on and about reference 1, we thought we would go this year.

Outward bound, we took the complex scenic route, avoiding the main road running south through Lake, Sandown and Shanklin, only getting slightly lost on the way.

Arrived to clock the piano noticed at reference 2 and then to take tea, coffee and cake on the pleasantly shaded veranda overlooking the gardens. From where we headed north into parts Australian, included the shaded hydrangea walk, which continues to puzzle us as these hydrangeas thrive while seaside hydrangeas in this country seem generally to be planted in full sun. Wikipedia not helpful on this point, although it does list near 50 different sorts of hydrangea and does discuss the colour of the flowers. See reference 3.

Spent a little time with an araucaria araucana in order to try and work out how its leaves worked. Opposite, alternate, whorls, spiral or what?

Base of tree

Twig one

Twig two

Top of tree

Enlargement

On the spot, this was a complete failure, apart from coming across lichen in twig two, and I decided that one would need to take a bit of twig to pieces on a bench to get to the bottom of the matter. Then, this afternoon, I thought to enlarge the snap of the trunk, which suggested that spiral was a possibility at the bottom, while whorl was a possibility at the top. So still not much further forward. See reference 4 for a previous failure.

Hairy cucumber

The next puzzle was what can only be described as a hairy cucumber. Not much further forward with this one, despite a lady next to us asking her phone. It seems the idea was that you took a picture and then it told you what it was, a reasonably challenging bit of image processing, which the lady did admit to being work in progress, with its identifications quite often being quite wrong.

A few lizards on the rocks. A few turtles in the fish pond. But the echium pininana's were disappointing. Nothing like as fine as they had been a couple of years previously, for which see reference 1. Maybe they come in bursts, then need a few years to recuperate.

Lunch in the rather fancy café, taking the form of crab sandwiches. Sandwiches themselves were good, but they could not resist adding some mixed leaves, looking but not tasting like dandelion leaves, and some potato crisps made out of assorted root vegetables of colour. But the café was comfortable and did provide some welcome shade.

After which we headed south into parts dry, where there was a lot of agapanthus, aloe and palm. Some cacti, including some rather spectacular prickly pears. Snaps inhibited by the bright sun making it impossible to see what I was doing. Giant lily house rather too hot for me on what was already a rather hot day, and the giant lily seemed to have shrunk. I can only suppose it takes a while to grow a new giant when the old one wears out.

Snap in the shade

Plus a carex pendula, just to show that their hearts were in the right place. Plus some echium leaves far left and some agapanthus.

All in all a rather lazy day at the gardens. Entirely satisfactory. And we took the main road back to Brading!

Reference 1: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2017/07/echium-pininana.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/07/piano-18.html.

Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrangea.

Reference 4: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/05/poundbury-to-holne.html.