A relaxing afternoon in the company of ducks (Claremont Landscape Garden (Esher))

Member Name: eilidhcatriona

Product:	Claremont Landscape Garden (Esher)
Date:	30/07/09 (90 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Small but not too small, pretty, relaxing, lots of different water birds

Disadvantages: No flowers, smelly algae!

I recently visited Claremont Landscape Gardens with my parents whilst they were visiting the outskirts of London. We chose to go there as they didn't want to venture too far into London (having done that the day before) and we didn't want to go anywhere that cost too much. With both of them being National Trust for Scotland members, they get free entry to English National Trust members, so it would only be me that we would have to pay for at Claremont.

Claremont Landscape Gardens are situated just south of Esher. The leaflet we had giving information on travel wasn't terribly helpful, but having checked the map book we found a little National Trust symbol so we were able to follow that - we went by car, so I can't comment on getting there by public transport (although it must be possible as the leaflet states that they will give you a £1 tea room voucher if you show a public transport ticket). Once we reached Esher we found that the gardens were signposted, and there was an ample car park.

Entry for me, a non-member adult, was £6. A child would be £3, and there are group and family prices available. Having paid, we took our map and headed into the gardens. There was a guided tour on offer (free of charge I believe) at 2pm in the afternoon, but we decided to give it a miss and potter about on our own.

An important point to make is that Claremont isn't landscaped like we might expect today, with lots of pretty flower beds and terraces. It was created in the 18th century, and landscaping then consisted of trees. So don't go expecting to see lots of flowers, as I have to admit I did.

One of the main features of the garden, which you meet as soon as you enter, is the large pond, which is home to a lot of interesting water fowl. Apart from the usual Canada and Greylag geese (and of course the ever present Mallard), Coots, Moorhens etc, we saw Black Swans, Emperor Geese and Egyptian Geese (which are kind of interesting but we've been a bit spoilt as there's a huge family of them on the campsite my parents stay at when they visit). There are identification leaflets available for 50p, but there's also one on a noticeboard by the pond. According to this, we could have seen Mandarin Ducks - but they must have been hiding. My parents are RSPB members and love bird watching, especially spotting rare birds so they were very happy about this, and I quite enjoyed spotting all the different types too.

The map you can pick up at the entrance shows the paths around the garden, and also indicates where there is a steep slope, useful for those who aren't too mobile. My mum is an occasional wheelchair user , but decided not to use it on this day. And to be honest, it was probably for the best - the paths were reasonably wide but they were noticeably bumpy even on foot, so it would have been uncomfortable in the chair.

Another main feature, which overlooks the pond, is the grass amphitheatre. It is rather impressive, all terraced and quite steep. You can't climb up it although there are some benches on it, as it is roped and signed off at the bottom. There is a terrace at the top which you can get onto, but we didn't as it would have involved more slopes and walking than we wanted to do.

We followed a gently sloping path up the hill beside the amphitheatre. On the map there were some statues of animals marked, so we thought we'd see them and then continue on to the Camellia Terrace and the Belvedere Tower at the top. Unfortunately the camellias weren't in flower, but they would have been lovely a month or two earlier!

The Belvedere Tower belongs to the Claremont School next door to the gardens, which once was the house which the gardens belonged to. On the first clear weekend each month they allow the gardens to open the tower to visitors, and as it happened we were visiting on one such weekend. However, once we walked up through the gardens and realised just how big the trees were, we decided not to bother as the view would in fact have been largely obscured by the tree tops.

So we went back down the hill and strolled around the pond, from where you can see the island pavilion, which is a kind of summer house on the small island in the pond. You can't get over to the island so I assume it is never opened to visitors. Tucked away in the corner of the pond is a "grotto", which is a series of caves which look man-made. There was very little information given about this in the leaflet, but it looked pretty.

One criticism at this point, once we reached the corner of the pond furthest from the entrance. There was a lot of unpleasant looking slimey green algae in the pond, and given there was a nasty pong in that area, we suspected it came from that. Now I'm no biologist, but my mum is, and she explained that algae is healthy for water, but in large quantities like this it blocks the sunlight into the water and the plants underneath can't photosynthesise. So this large volume of algae is probably bad for the pond life, and it was smelly. Bad all round really.

I thought that the gardens were large enough to accommodate a good number of visitors without seeming crowded, but that they weren't so big as to cause you problems getting round it all in an afternoon.

Once we had walked all the way round the pond, we exited the garden and went to the tea room. I have very happy memories of National Trust tea rooms from when I was young, you couldn't beat a NT scone, so imagine my upset when I found pre packed sandwiches and clearly not homemade scones on offer! I was very hungry by this point so I had a tuna sandwich and some apple juice, and my parents shared some fruit cake and lemon cake, and had some coffee. It was all perfectly nice, I can't fault it at all (although the sandwich was £3.25, a bit much for just tuna!), but it just wasn't what I expected. I wanted home baking and freshly made sandwiches, but having brought this up I was told by my mum that its all down to health and safety...what else! Apparently it used to be that the volunteers would do the baking at home, but now they need a food premises certificate or something, no one wants to do that for their home, so they buy in the stuff. How rubbish. Health and safety, pah - I want my NT scone!!!

Near the tea room, incidentally, is a childrens play area. It looked like fun, but I decided not to try it out! One thing I did like about its position was that it was tucked away between the gardens themselves and the exit, so children can enjoy themselves and make loads of noise without disturbing other visitors to the gardens or scaring off the ducks!

The toilets were situated in the car park. Maybe an odd spot, but there you go. I didn't use them, but I was assured they were of an adequate condition and cleanliness!

On the whole, I enjoyed our visit to Claremont Landscape Gardens. While it wasn't entirely what we were expecting, being rather plain and full of trees not flowers, it was an enjoyable afternoon - fortunately we had good weather after a wet morning. The gardens are a pleasant and relaxing place to spend an afternoon. However, we were glad that we only paid one entrance fee between the three of us - we all agreed that £6 each, £18 in total, would not have been worth it.

Summary: A nice way to spend an afternoon, but a bit pricey for non-National Trust members