Saturday in Kew

Saturday was another perfect day in London.  Seventy degrees, sunshine--just lovely.  I decided to spend it in the garden, specifically Kew Gardens, a few miles up the Thames from Central London, half an hour on the underground, but a world away.

A lot of other people made the same decision.  This is the queue at Kew.

Once you're in, it's like paradise.  Flowers everywhere....

That's the Palm House in the background, one of many greenhouses and other structures in the Gardens.

The Cherry Blossoms were gorgeous....

Another of the greenhouses, the Temperate House, pictured above, is the largest Victorian Greenhouse in the world.

There was also a Japanese Gatehouse....

And a Pagoda

And Queen Charlotte's cottage....apparently used only for picnics.

It is actually quite small inside, with  no bedrooms that I could see.

But mostly, Kew is just beautiful walkways

And a lake with swans....here's one on a nest at the end of the lake.

I think those green things in the front of the picture are there to protect certain plants.  

The birds there are amazing.  They don't spook when you go near them and they don't beg for food.  But near the lake they can be very loud.  To wit...

After walking around for a couple of hours, I just laid down/sat down for 20 minutes under a beautiful flowering tree.

I had read in one of my London  books that the neighborhood of Richmond was right up the Thames a few miles so even though my feet were bothering me a bit, I decided to take the river walk.  And I'm really glad I did.  The walk was lovely, calm.  

With lots of unexpected delights like a Heron who seemed to be posing for me....

And a castle....

And a passenger boat leisurely going by....

But when I got to Richmond, it was packed with people by the river.

At first I thought there was something special going on, maybe a boat race.  But it seems this was just the response of the people of Richmond, and a lot of young visitors, to a perfect day on the river.