Crarae Gardens, Crarae, Minard, by Inveraray, Argyll PA32 8YA
These spectacular 50-acre gardens are situated on a hillside overlooking Loch Fyne. With its rare and beautiful plants, abundance of wildlife including otters in the burn, and neolithic cairn, it is one of Scotland’s hidden gems and well worth visiting at all times of the year.
Crarae Gardens are Himalayan-inspired and were initially developed in 1912 by Lady Grace Campbell. It is believed her nephew, renowned plant hunter and writer Reginald Farrer, is responsible for some of the planting and design of the garden.
The gardens are a wonderful mix of important and exotic trees such as magnolias from Tibet, redwoods from California, eucalyptus from the Australian Alps, and maples from Japan. Beneath a luxurious canopy of trees are over 600 species of rhododendrons and hybrids ranging in colour from pure white to the deepest crimson. It is a must-see in spring when the colours come into full bloom!
In the winter, don’t miss the Himalayan Gorge. It is spectacular year-round with the sunlight glinting through the trees, but is particularly beautiful in the winter with the tumbling burn and waterfalls in full flow.
Website: https://www.nts.org.uk/visit/places/crarae-garden
Telephone: 01546 886614
Opening times: Nov-Mar 9.30-16.00 Apr-Oct 9.00-17.30
Admission costs: Adult £7.50 Concession £5.50 Family £18.50 NTS & NT Free
Garden of the Week is in association with Discover Scottish Gardens. For more information, advice and day-out ideas, visit discoverscottishgardens.org
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here