Please assist. Is Kew Gardens near Hampton Court Palace?
Oct 16th, 2006 | 01:44 PM
#1
Original Poster
Joined: Oct 2006
Posts: 5
Likes: 0
Please assist. Is Kew Gardens near Hampton Court Palace?
Is Kew Gardens a realistic afternoon venue after a full morning visit to HCP? If not, I would appreciate suggestions for a more geographically realistic attraction near HCP. We are staying at The Dorchester and will travel by public transport to and from the Palace. Thank you!
Oct 16th, 2006 | 01:55 PM
#3
Joined: Jan 2003
Posts: 8,159
Likes: 0
Westminster Passenger Services Assocociation (Upriver) Ltd, between Westminster and Kew and beyond, run between April and October.
Route: Westminster, Putney, Kew, Richmond, Hampton Court.
Day trips: it is not really practical to travel from Westminster to see Kew and Hampton Court in a day as there are insufficient services but, starting from Kew, the Gardens and Hampton Court can be combined in a day. The last boat from Kew leaves at 1.30pm for Hampton Court and back from Hampton Court at 3pm, 4pm and 5pm (CHECK times with telephone number below).
Passengers should ALWAYS check timings of return journeys from Kew and Hampton Court (all timings approximate due to tides and boats may be cancelled).
Tel: +44 (0)20 7930 4721 (Westminster Pier) for information and current times.
Can't think of anything nearby.
Route: Westminster, Putney, Kew, Richmond, Hampton Court.
Day trips: it is not really practical to travel from Westminster to see Kew and Hampton Court in a day as there are insufficient services but, starting from Kew, the Gardens and Hampton Court can be combined in a day. The last boat from Kew leaves at 1.30pm for Hampton Court and back from Hampton Court at 3pm, 4pm and 5pm (CHECK times with telephone number below).
Passengers should ALWAYS check timings of return journeys from Kew and Hampton Court (all timings approximate due to tides and boats may be cancelled).
Tel: +44 (0)20 7930 4721 (Westminster Pier) for information and current times.
Can't think of anything nearby.
Oct 16th, 2006 | 02:14 PM
#5
Joined: Oct 2005
Posts: 75,081
Likes: 50
From your other thread I think you are traveling in January. While Kew can be a rewarding visit any time of year - there isn't all that much to see other than the glass houses in winter. Also, you are likely to have cold/wet weather and it will be dark very early. So I would probably skip Kew in the afternoon after Hampton Court Palace. Just take the train back into London and do something in teh city . . . .
Oct 23rd, 2006 | 02:26 AM
#6
Joined: Apr 2003
Posts: 17,268
Likes: 0
Saying "there's nothing to see in Kew except the glass houses" is a bit like saying "there's nothing in the Louvre but paintings."
Kew's the largest living plant collection in the world, among a number of other superlatives. The overwhelming majority of those plants are under cover - and some of the greenhouses rank among the most beautiful museum buildings anywhere.
Kew is also a - well to be honest, rather pedestrianly landscaped - 300 acre botanic garden. Sometimes there's the odd show in the open that's spectacular - but you can almost always see the same show better elsewhere. In late January, for example, the London area usually has loads of extravagant snowdrop displays. But unlike London's parks and Britain's famous private gardens, Kew's not been designed to look impressive (though it sometimes does): the open areas have been set out so that the hundreds of thousands of specimens (and there are rarely more than a handful of each specimen) can thrive.
The indoor display areas are massive, often stunning (the orchids, the palms or the living stone collections, for example) and relatively well captioned. Captioning in the open part of Kew is accurate, near universal and adequate - but generally close to useless for most of us who aren't expert in plant taxonomy.
Above all, Kew's historic importance in moving plants around the world was based mainly on tropical plants - almost all of which are kept indoors. What's outside is at best pretty: what's inside is a major historical monument, and the only major museum in London that lets you feel and play with most of the displays.
All of which said, there are two flaws in your plan. Kew closes at 1615 in January (there's practically no lightning between the glasshouses, even though you can see a good deal in the houses themelves when it's dark outside)
Second, the sheer scale of Kew's collection (as well as its underinforming captioning) makes getting a guide, more than any other museum I've visited, utterly transformatory: only with a guide can most of realise that the difference detween daffodilus officinalis and daffodilus bacchanalium is actually very, very significant, and that the Kew specimens are decendants of the ones Joseph Banks brought back from the Sandwich Islands voyage he was the only survivor of.
Free guided tours leave at 1100 and 1400: for most of us they're an essential addition to casual serendipitous meandering. You may find it difficult to get from HCP to Kew in time to do much.
Though if you're expecting a beautiful garden, then even though a lot of its trees are evergreen, Kew's not going to meet your needs.
Kew's the largest living plant collection in the world, among a number of other superlatives. The overwhelming majority of those plants are under cover - and some of the greenhouses rank among the most beautiful museum buildings anywhere.
Kew is also a - well to be honest, rather pedestrianly landscaped - 300 acre botanic garden. Sometimes there's the odd show in the open that's spectacular - but you can almost always see the same show better elsewhere. In late January, for example, the London area usually has loads of extravagant snowdrop displays. But unlike London's parks and Britain's famous private gardens, Kew's not been designed to look impressive (though it sometimes does): the open areas have been set out so that the hundreds of thousands of specimens (and there are rarely more than a handful of each specimen) can thrive.
The indoor display areas are massive, often stunning (the orchids, the palms or the living stone collections, for example) and relatively well captioned. Captioning in the open part of Kew is accurate, near universal and adequate - but generally close to useless for most of us who aren't expert in plant taxonomy.
Above all, Kew's historic importance in moving plants around the world was based mainly on tropical plants - almost all of which are kept indoors. What's outside is at best pretty: what's inside is a major historical monument, and the only major museum in London that lets you feel and play with most of the displays.
All of which said, there are two flaws in your plan. Kew closes at 1615 in January (there's practically no lightning between the glasshouses, even though you can see a good deal in the houses themelves when it's dark outside)
Second, the sheer scale of Kew's collection (as well as its underinforming captioning) makes getting a guide, more than any other museum I've visited, utterly transformatory: only with a guide can most of realise that the difference detween daffodilus officinalis and daffodilus bacchanalium is actually very, very significant, and that the Kew specimens are decendants of the ones Joseph Banks brought back from the Sandwich Islands voyage he was the only survivor of.
Free guided tours leave at 1100 and 1400: for most of us they're an essential addition to casual serendipitous meandering. You may find it difficult to get from HCP to Kew in time to do much.
Though if you're expecting a beautiful garden, then even though a lot of its trees are evergreen, Kew's not going to meet your needs.
