Scotland has a different geological structure from England. North of the Southern Upland Fault, Scotland was once part of a separate tectonic plate to England. Scotland's climate is also different: the growing season is approximately a month shorter with West Scotland wetter than England and East Scotland drier than all but the East of England. Scotland also has a separate design tradition.

This is more evident in architecture than in garden design but the presence of Scots baronial buildings and local construction materials and techniques gives Scots gardens a distinctive character and, in good weather, a brilliant clarity of form and colour which sets them apart from other UK gardens.

Key Scottish Gardens

• Crathes Castle Garden
  A sixteenth century castle with a twentieth century Arts and Crafts garden.It might be described as ‘The Sissinghurst of Scotland’. The baronial tower, beside which the garden stands, dates from the late 1500s. For centuries the tower stood in lonely isolation, protecting the Burnett family and allowing them fine views of the woods and moors. In the twentieth century a fine garden was made by Sir James Burnett of Leys. It is a walled garden with sculptured topiary and brilliant planting.
• Drummond Castle Garden
  An old castle with a fine nineteenth century garden. The multiplex sundial, carved by Charles I's master mason, survives from the 1630s. It was made at a time of great interest in astronomy and when sundials were the only accurate way of telling the time. Drummond castle is set on a ridge. Terraces step down the hill to the south and a large parterre takes the form of Scotland's flag, the St Andrew's cross, centred on the old sundial. The design was carried out by Lewis Kennedy, though the terracing may have been influenced by Charles Barry. Today, the planting is simpler but the garden retains the atmosphere of the Country Life black and white photographs of British gardens. There are no ladies in flowing white dresses, except in a painting of Queen Victoria's 1842 visit, but the peacocks continue to give an aristocratic air to the scenery.
• Royal Botanic Garden
  Edinburgh An early nineteenth century botanical garden with a good layout, a splendid site and panoramic views of the Edinburgh skyline. The arboretum and rock garden were made after the appointment of Sir Isaac Bayley Balfour as Regius Keeper in 1888.

Travel Arrangements For Scottish Garden Visiting
Many garden tour companies operate in Britain with the main groups of operators being based in the UK and the USA. The UK operators tend to be lower priced but do not organize travel to Britain and are likely to use larger vehicles. Independent travellers can visit many gardens, but by no means all, using public transport.

Car hire is also easy. One of the difficulties for the independent traveller is that many gardens are open only on a few days per week and only in the afternoon. This makes it difficult to visit as many gardens in a day as might appear possible from their geographical proximity.

Walking through the gardens of a Northern Ireland grand estate, beneath tall trees, past rare and tender plants, you feel yourself coming under the spell of the place. What gives Ulster gardens this curious dreamlike quality? It's those clouds drifting in from the Atlantic: when they empty themselves over Ireland, the moisture has nowhere to go. The water vapour hangs in the air and casts a soft misty light over the landscape.

But Northern Ireland can be breezy too. Just when you think that heavy sky pressing down on the land will never budge, a south-westerly wind chases the clouds out to sea and the sky is blue. Wherever there is a green patch, a leafy lane, a hawthorn thicket, you'll find primroses and wild bluebells but the most conspicuous spring flower is the daffodil. Northern Ireland’s daffodil breeders carry off the top prizes. Rose breeding awards too have showered like confetti on Ulster nurseries.

Private Walled Garden on The Banks of The River Bush
In his book, Gardens of Ireland, Terence Reeves-Smyth describes Benvarden as having one of the few fully maintained walled gardens in Ireland, and undoubtedly the best walled garden in private hands.This historic estate has been in existence since the 1630s. It has been in the ownership of the Montgomery family since 1798.

Beautiful rose beds, well stocked kitchen garden and Victorian woodland pond. Tea-room. Established in 1630, Benvarden is situated on the banks of the River Bush where it is crossed by the Coleraine-Ballycastle road. A 37m long Victorian iron bridge also spans the river.

Features include a rose garden, a box and lavender parterre, a well stocked kitchen garden with hot houses, vinery, potting shed, melon house, and espalier-trained apple trees leaning against the high, curved, brick walls. There is also a very attractive cobbled stable yard, entered by an arch surmounted by a cupola and containing coach houses, stables and cart houses. A former stable houses Benvarden's tearoom.

A woodland pond, originally created in the 1850s but dell into dereliction, is the setting for a wild garden containing rhododendrons, camellias, primulas, bluebells and many other wild flowers. A former cow byre has been converted into a small museum displaying old farm and garden implements and other items of interest.

http://www.culturenorthernireland.org

Excerpt from "Northern Ireland Visitor Guide 2006" by Northern Ireland Tourist Board