Events for Members

Visit to Trebah Garden, Mawnan Smith

Monday, 14 July 2003  2.30pm

Numbers are limited to 16:

- It is essential to book in advance.  Please contact

  the Chairman, Jeremy Dart.  Tel: 01326 280721

- Meet as a group in the carpark at 2.30pm

- See adjacent article.

Annual General Meeting 2003

Monday, 20 October 2003, 7.00 for 7.30pm

Mawgan Village Hall

Guest speaker: Martin Matthews, ex Curator of Helston Museum.  Details in the Autumn Newsletter.

Christmas Social event

Tuesday, 2 December 2003  7.30pm

Halzephron Inn at Gunwalloe.

£7.50 per person to include a glass of wine or mulled wine and a buffet meal.

Cormorant

Oddly for a diving bird, its feathers are not completely waterproof and it has to spend some time each day with its wings outstretched drying in the wind

Trebah Garden, Mawnan Smith, Falmouth

As was reported in the last Newsletter, Maj Tony Hibbert, owner of Trebah Garden, has very generously invited a group of our Members to visit the gardens free of charge.  He will give an introductory talk, followed by a conducted tour of the gardens.  The following extracts from Trebah’s publicity material give a flavour of the magic of the place:

“Trebah is a uniquely beautiful, 26 acre Cornish ravine garden, the wild and magical result of 160 years of inspired and dedicated creation.  A steeply wooded ravine descends 200 feet down to a private secluded beach on the historic Helford River.  A stream cascades over waterfalls and meanders through ponds of giant Koi carp and exotic water plants before winding through two acres of blue and white Hydrangeas and spilling onto the beach.  Glades of sub-tropical ferns and palms mingle with a forest of trees and shrubs in ever-changing colours and scents, contained beneath a canopy of century-old Rhododendrons and Magnolias.

Trebah was first planted in the 1840s by Charles Fox, a Quaker landowner and inspired gardener.  The rarest and most exotic trees and plants were imported from all over the world to create this lovely garden and Fox ensured that every last sapling was painstakingly placed for maximum effect, even though he knew that he would never see the garden in its mature splendour.  Future owners continued his work until the Second World War when the house was sold, the estate split up and the garden lay neglected for the next 40 years.

Then, in 1980, Trebah was bought by the Hibbert family, who began a massive programme to restore the gardens to their Victorian heyday.  Trebah opened to the public in 1987 and, three years later, the family donated the house, lodge and garden to the Trebah Garden Trust, a registered charity, to ensure that the garden is preserved for the pleasure of all future generations.  The Trust is managed by an independent Council of Management, elected by the Members of the Trust of which there are over 700.

Trebah is wild, extravagant and enchanted, full of unexpected corners and beautiful surprises.  It certainly is no formal, pampered, prissy garden – no clipped hedges, manicured lawns or ‘Keep Off The Grass’ signs.  This is a garden that children adore.  They marvel at the Gunnera Passage, a tunnel of giant rhubarb 16 feet high, and race around the Bamboozle.  Trebah is full of play areas and trails for children of all ages and, with swimming and picnics on Yankee Beach, it makes a perfect setting for a family day out.”