Road Trip Part 2 - Plymouth, Lost Gardens of Heligan

From Bournemouth, we made our way towards Cornwall. It took longer than expected because of the weekend traffic. After 3 hours we only got as far as Plymouth, and it was past lunch time, so we stopped for lunch. Driving towards the town centre, we found a nice little marina called the Plymouth Barbican and had lunch at the Seafood & Pasta restaurant.

Then we continued our journey to the Lost Garden of Heligan. The last entry was at 4:30pm and we got there at 4:25pm!! Friend A Sook said she preferred this to the Eden Project and said how mystical it was. I didn't even realise it but I watched a documentary about this recently. The garden was a beautiful place but it was "lost" after the gardeners went to war and never came back. It was only in 1990 that it was rediscovered and work was done to restore it to what it is now.

It had a "jungle" area (left) which Friend A Sook likened to a Malaysian jungle, though I didn't feel it. Only true tropical tree I could find were some skinny banana trees. There were some lovely gardens where food and flowers were grown. There were some nice lemon trees and one of them had fruits the size of my hand!!

For me, the main attraction were the "mud people". These were sculptors made in 1998 by Cornish artists Sue Hill and her brother Pete. One was called the "Giant's Head", and the other was called "Mudmaid". They are great works of art and one day when I have my own garden, I'd like to make such a sculptor in it.

The Gardens was very big, and some of the paths around it was very steep. As we didn't have enough time we didn't go round all of it. I would have liked to spend the day there walking about and sitting around just enjoying the scenery and fresh air. At one point, you can see the sea over some hills, and we also came across a friendly robin perched on a branch (we stood about 3 feet away and it didn't fly away) and also a little bunny rabbit munching on the grass in front of the Giant's Head.

We left when the gardens were closing at 6 pm and made our way across Cornwall to Newquay where we had booked our night's accomodation.