After a snack and a drink we were revived to continue looking around the garden, although now it was quite a dull day. First we headed to the Herb Garden, beautifully laid out with areas for medicinal, perfumery and cooking herbs.
Choragic Monument of Lysicrates (copy)
The Herb Garden
Herbs from around the world used for a wide variety of purposes – culinary, medicinal and aromatic – are on display here. A sensory fountain and sundial modelled on the celestial sphere are also features.
From there we wound around the perimeter of the gardens, passing by the Palace Rose Garden with its Federation style shelter pavilion (1897), the Pioneer Garden, the Morshead Fountain and towards the Tropical Centre which was unfortunately closed for renovation. So we walked through the Rainforest and Palm Grove to visit the Fernery and then on to the Succulent Garden.
Rose Garden Pavilion
Succulent Garden
Desert landscapes are a mosaic of colours, shapes and textures. This garden provides a rare opportunity to experience and closely examine the bizarre shapes of arid-adapted plants.
The Royal Botanic Gardens has 18 feature gardens within its boundaries, and makes for a captivating day out.
More lovely walks can be found over at my friend Jo’s place.
Earth laughs in flowers 
I can’t keep up! This is a great post. I’m sold on a week in Sydney.
It was great to have so much time in Sydney, I even managed one more visit to these gardens before I left – last week I was enjoying my last day in the sun! Today is so dull I have the lights on indoors already 😦
Wow! Lovely place…and I like your collages
Thanks Sue! It is a lovely garden – so much to see, you really need to do it in short bursts though as it can be very tiring in the heat. (No danger of that today though 😦 )
Cold, cold, cold here and damp too 😦
Brings back memories Jude, we will be back in Sydney mid March will look forward to visiting the gardens then. Love how you have done the galleries, what in interesting way to split the photos into thirds and add a B&W sliver, it enhances the colour. How did you do that????
I look forward to seeing what is in bloom in March PP. Even a few weeks later things had changed in the gardens! I can’t claim credit for the interesting splits (got a bit carried away, but I was having fun playing with the different effects) as I used pixlr Autodesk to create them! https://pixlr.com/desktop
Enjoy the festive season PP – have you got family visiting?
Ooh- looks like a good place to start playing 🙂
We go to the eldest son and family, 5 grandkids, they live approx. 40 minute drive near Brisbane. It is SO hot at the moment 30+ I have put shade cloth on my new veggie bed, they were all cooking…
Wow! Lovely.
You’v e been playing again! 🙂 And I love it! That header photo looks staggeringly good in B & W! I must find time these hols to experiment and play a bit (but when???) Maybe Boxing Day…
We’ve been to lots of botanical gardens around the world, Jude, and a few have been quite disappointing. This is probably the finest I’ve ever seen and your photos are superb! Thank you so much for sharing. 🙂
I know! Sorry! Just couldn’t help myself – there is NOTHING on the television in Australia or New Zealand unless you have satellite (and even then it is mostly UK or USA repeats) so I had some time to play in the evening when Lorenzo was asleep 🙂
I have another garden to show you in NZ which was pretty dramatic too!
Ahh I guessed you were using pixlr, I use the app on my tablet – it rocks! This garden could almost be in England 🙂
It’s a great application for creating some interesting effects!