West Linton Village Gardens

living shed roof

If someone had told me during my younger days that I would be spending time visiting gardens in the streaming rain sometime in my future life,  I would have thought they had taken leave of their senses. And yet, that's exactly what I did today. These were not just any gardens but our local ones in the village of West Linton. I wanted to go and support everyone very badly but the forecast was atrocious. By 2 pm when the gardens opened to the public the rain was coming down from the sky by the bucket load but fortunately the winds that are rumoured to accompany tropical storm Bertha (she landed down south this morning) hadn't arrived in Scotland yet. So I suggested to John that we drive down to the village and then decide what we would do in the sure knowledge that once I got him that far I would get him into the gardens too. And so it proved.

tree house (the tree itself has gone, coming down some years ago)

In the handout for the garden tour (we travelled between the 6 open gardens by car proving we're not completely insane!) it states that "Peeblesshire can hardly be described as a gardener's paradise; the county is the highest in the British Isles. Rainfall varies from 35 inchies to 66 inchies (quite a bit of that fell today!). Frost has been recorded in every month of the year" (at least we were spared that!). All in all it's challenging as we know only too well from our own experience. But despite that and the unrelenting rain the gardens looked wonderful. I'm given you snapshots from almost all of them and of course quite a few individual flowers that proved irresistible.

Poppy

In one of the gardens a frog was spotted and of course I had to go down on my knees (thus soaking my leggings) to take the picture. I doubt we would have seen it by ourselves as it was so well disguised. It didn't seem to mind the visitors. Yes, there were more inveterate gardeners out and about and there was even a bus full of Australian visitors who came to look. All were equipped with large brollies. Apparently they had been warned about the Scottish weather.

Blanket flower. Normally the petals would be upright but the rain had made them droop.

It was surprising to see how much colour was still on show in all the gardens. Due to the rather splendid summer we've had (today really was an exception) all the plants flowered rather early this year so it must have been quite a job to make sure the plants were still putting on a show.

 I don't know what these roses are called but oh, they were breathtakingly beautiful.

 In another garden it were the dahlias that stole the show as far as I was concerned. 

The garden in Station Road was one we have visited in previous years and it's such a beauty. A true earthly paradise. This was the garden we visited last and by that time we were fairly drenched despite the large umbrella which I must admit was mainly used to protect my camera! I have my priorities!

It's stunning to see not just how gorgeous the gardens were but how very different despite being in the same little village. All the owners were present and very proud of their gardens, rightly so. Both they and the visitors were all in very good humour in the good old British spirit that we were all in this together despite the weather. And anyway what else would we talk about it!

Alstromeria

And in my particular case I was pleased with how the raindrops enhanced the flowers, but I must admit that I'm happy to be back in dry clothes now we're home again.