A visit to Waterperry

Waterperry's famous Asters and Rudbeckias in bloom, later summer

A lovely if flying visit today to Waterperry Gardens on the outskirts of Oxford. 

I’ve been going to Waterperry for years and it’s one of my favourite places. A few years ago, while working at GMTV as a regular freelance overnight News Editor, I was sitting in the newsroom at 4am wondering what exactly I could do at this time of the morning - other than sleep - to make myself feel a bit less deathly. Clearly sleep was not on the agenda, as I still had several hours to go before my shift finished. 

Instead, I decided that when I got home I would apply for a job at Waterperry as a seasonal gardener - a few hours a week, to act as a welcoming counterbalance to the world of overnights, breaking news, too much coffee and carbohydrate and general exhaustion.

A couple of weeks later I started work and I will never forget Garden Manager Pat Havers’ opening gambit: ‘I want everyone working here to be happy.’  Wouldn’t life be great if all managers were like that?! 

Kitted out in my official uniform, I grabbed a hoe, a barrow, a bucket and a kneeler, and headed out from the staff shed ready to get stuck in. My first job was to tidy up and deadhead some of the bush roses in the Rose Garden.  I must have passed the test because I was there until the end of the summer, having spent four very happy months weeding, deadheading, and generally learning loads from Pat and her small and extremely dedicated team. 

Waterperry is a fabulous garden and if you haven’t visited I can’t recommend it highly enough - especially if you enjoy a good cuppa and a slice of cake! At the moment the highlights include a really fabulous display of thousands of fritillaries in the riverside meadow, and in the next few weeks the famous Herbaceous Border will start to fill out with thousands of cottage garden favourites which will bloom until end end of Autumn. 

I will post some video of today's visit in the next couple of days. In the meantime, to see some of my previous films about Waterperry you can have a look here:

https://vimeo.com/album/1886260 

Follow Waterperry’s news and tips at their blog here: 

http://www.waterperrygardensblog.co.uk/

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