Kew Gardens

On Sunday April 22nd we went to Kew Gardens (the Royal Botanic Gardens) to see the bluebells. Little did we realise what a trek it would be! The bluebell season is quite short and it is one of the special seasons of the year (bluebells are a protected species in the UK) so there is a 'bluebell walk' set up. We headed off on it and then realised it was 5km long, which is a lot when you are expecting a lazy Sunday afternoon in a garden!

The beginning of the walk took us through some big glasshouses with different zones set up inside which was very cool. One of them was about changes in plants through history. Then we found the first sprinkling of bluebells and sat down to wait for our other friends to catch up and join us. Time for a snack and a bit of a nap in the sunshine too :-)

Me, Nick, Steve and Jared













Napping Nick :-)


















Headed on to Queen Charlotte's Cottage which Queen Charlotte used to have picnics in. It was very pretty.

Then we got into bluebell area proper which was pretty special; large glades completely covered in bluebells. It was quite spectacular.














Steve, Nick and Beck strolling along the Syon Vista












The rest of the walk, to be honest, was a bit of a chore. The gardens are lovely but it would be nicer just to find a pretty spot and hang out. Maybe its just that it was a Sunday and I had worked the night before. We gladly stopped at a cafe for lunch and from there it wasn't TOO far back to the gate to go home.
A water lily in the Wet Tropics Zone, also home to the Titan Arum, which 'has the largest unbranched inflorescence in the world.'

Term break

The next thing after Easter was A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Roundhouse theatre in Camden. It was performed only half in English and the other half in a few different Indian languages. Knowing the play well really helped but it was amazing just to watch as well - really physical with dance and acrobatics and music... It's quite hard to explain but I really enjoyed it.

That Saturday we had a house party/barbecue at Queen's Drive for Ruth's leaving party (Jared has moved into her room). It was a really nice day and a fun afternoon/evening. Check out Nick and Tash's blog for some photos (link to the right).

This was all during the two week term break for me from school. I did a few cool jobs with Esprit - one at the Foreign Office, which is right beside number 10!! Security was pretty full-on - I had to take my passport and we weren't allowed to use our mobile phones in there. No radios either, which made the organisation for the dinner quite difficult, because normally the event manager has radio communication with the chef and things like that. So it was a bit disorganised but it all ended up okay in the end.