Private views

One of the best ways-often the only way-to visit the finest privately owned gardens in the country is by joining an exclusive tour. Non Morris does exactly that

- Non Morris

I AM sitting on a Persian-carpeted veranda in the loveliest of west Dorset gardens admiring our picnic lunch: huge platters of asparagus, overfilled sandwiches and seriously good Scotch eggs. We have explored the garden, laced with delicate wisteria and radiant with ferns and Solomon’s seal, and paused in the blossom-laden apple orchard. Now, we are embarking on a cider tasting led by poet and cider historian James Crowden. If you don’t drink cider, worry not: organic apple juice or Champagne?

This is the G&T Earthly Paradise tour, a blissful six days visiting west Dorset’s finest gardens, master-minded by magazine editor-turned-passionate gardener Simon Tiffin and COUNTRY LIFE columnist Jason Goodwin. Our small group— from the US, Australia, Spain and the UK— is entertained from the moment we climb onto the Goodwin-chauffeured minibus. We stay at Symondsbury Manor, amid the friendly and generous atmosphere of the best weekend house party—towering cakes for tea, delicious dinners with wines selected by G&T friend (and wildflower gardener) Johnnie Boden and breakfasts paired with orange juice handsqueezed by Mr Goodwin or Mr Tiffin as they describe the delights of the day ahead.

It is special—and hilarious—to be shooed deep into the borders at Julian and Isabel Bannerman’s Ashington Manor, to breathe in the heady scent of Cardiocrinum giganteum and a privilege to be able to ask about each plant in the gorgeously coloured double borders. There are strolls with Jaspar Conran discussing his idyllic cottage-garden planting at Bettiscombe Manor and an afternoon with garden designer Tania Compton exploring the atmospheric space made by the late artist John Hubbard in the picturesque hamlet of Chilcombe. Another G&T friend, Howard Sooley, will call in one evening over drinks to talk about his approach to photographing gardens...