Ben Lomond Station

Australia has an open gardens scheme and most weekends in Spring see one or two gardens open in any region. New England is no exception, and yesterday we visited an excellent garden at Ben Lomond Station.

Ben Lomond is obviously named after its Scottish counterpart, and indeed there is a Ben Lomond Mountain. It's altogether higher than the original, coming in at 1520m (5000 feet). Although Ben Lomond village has a railway station (disused, but the highest in Australia), the word 'station' means a large grazing property. Originally, Ben Lomond Station was a massive 300,000 acres (136,000 ha.), but now it's smaller.

One other bit of information: the open gardens are not at all like those found at UK's stately homes. Usually they are simply well-maintained and designed gardens around ordinary houses in town or out in the country. Ben Lomond is 60 km north of Armidale in the middle of nowhere, and the house, while nice, was nowhere near a stately home!

The garden was one of the best we've seen. The owners had managed to maintain acres of flawless lawn (easier at Ben Lomond because it has a wet climate and low temperatures (unsurprising even in Australia at nearly 5000 feet). Then owners over the last 150 years had planted lots of grand trees, many from Europe including Oak, Ash, Elms, and Linden. There was also lots of pine trees, including the Monterey Pine.

Scattered among the tall trees were lots of flower beds, including masses of Rhododendrons and interesting ground covers.

AS