Garden Visiting Project ... I am Google Mapping a wishlist :)

I went to a funeral in Dorset earlier in the week - with traffic its 4 hours each way - I left early and got one garden visit in on the way there, and had one planned for the way back (but stayed late at the wake instead) ... but the exercise proved that a 3hr drive to then see a couple of gardens would worth doing - otherwise I'll never get to see half the gardens that I want to.

Spend the rest of the week researching garden locations so that I could see what is "on the way" next time I have to go somewhere. I stuck them in Google Maps ... but it turns out that is not such a bright idea

My list has now gone over two pages in the "index" so only half the Flags show at any one time, and as they are in batches, sorted alphabetically, in the order that I found them they aren't even geographically organised ...

... so I think I need to come up with something else. By the looks of sites that I have seen I will need to set up some sort of interactive Google Maps page (gardens within X miles of Y type thing), and then have my Web Page "send" Google a list of all of the Pins that qualify (i.e. are within X miles) and it will display them.

The Google Maps thing doesn't work all that well with a Route either. Maybe its the way I am using it, but get the Pins up, then do a route and the pins disappear, then do view the Pins again and the route is there, but zoomed out ... fiddly! (not to mention having to switch to Page 2 and back to see if there are more pins there).

Anyway, for anyone interested, and feedback would be appreciated, here's a link to my kGardens Map of my Gardens to Visit Wishlist

(Don't forget there is a Page 2 option, at bottom of index in the left pane)

The colours of the Pins are to suit me at present - Seen, Not seen (Regular, National Trust, RHS) and Worth Seeing (not necessarily a 5-star garden, but perhaps on the way to somewhere that I might have a chance to visit soon)

All web links are plain text - I was planning to make them into pretty-links later (that will be a huge task in itself ... but I need to add a short summary or somesuch, otherwise I won't be able to decide which ones to visit, at a glance, when a journey offers itself.

Either way, I think I should be visiting a couple, once a week, before the season shuts up shop ... 3 hrs drive each way doesn't seem too horrific, I do that for business meetings without thinking too much about it and I'd prefer to be seeing gardens instead!

 

I wouldn't know where to begin with this sort of thing Kristen but is this link any good as an idea for your set up. If you hit the listed county it will then bring up a map and then click on the pins for the area.

http://www.gardenvisit.com/gardens/in/england

 

Me neither but it's a great idea...

 

I see you've put Beeleigh Abbey up there? Have you been there yet @Kristen? I used to live about away from it and I never visited it until a few years back.. Gorgeous house and grounds. The little meadow they had is worth a visit in may-june time too.



Also where are all the gardens in London?

 

Thanks, yes I've been harvesting links from www.gardenvisit.com, and also from www.greatbritishgardens.co.uk which I think has better content, some are common to both, some are in one or the other ...

Most of these things are organised by County - including NGS and so on, although they do have a Postcode proximity tool as well - but I don't think that County is much use; we live close to the border of 3 counties and can easily reach a 6 more ... hence why I thought that "everything along a journey" was more what I needed.

I haven't really got that but (my index being spread over two pages apart) Google Maps does at least allow me to enter a journey and then zoom in on all, or parts, of it to see what gardens are nearby.

Beyond that I need to know the type of garden - I'm generally not looking for a walk through rolling Capability Brown landscapes when I am on my way somewhere and I have particular favourite themes I am wanting to gather inspiration from - gardens with lots of rooms for example. Others will have different needs. My thought is to have colour coding on the Pins, or somesuch, that will indicate what sort of garden it is (currently done with a Pin for NT and RHS, but that falls a bit short of being useful!). Otherwise you have to click on every Pin and spend an hour or two researching ... and then (if you are like me!) you get Information Overload and throw your hands up in horror and chuck the whole idea!

Perhaps I should just visit all gardens in England in Alphabetical order instead, and dispense with "research"

Not been, but its helpful to know of gardens that folk have particularly enjoyed (and what features they liked).

Haven't done them as yet, as I figured that they weren't the sort of thing I would be "driving past"

Both the sites above have decent links to London gardens though:

http://www.greatbritishgardens.co.uk/gardens and parks in london.htm
http://www.gardenvisit.com/gardens/in/england/greater_london

 

Kristen, it was so much easier before technology! A map of England/Britain on a wall with a load of pin tags has got to be the way to go! You can pull each one as you've visited too.