Let me just say I think there are three different types of ticket, you don't need a whole day ticket, people are coming and going, it is busier then Piccadilly Circus but WAY more posh.
This is me on the train unusually in full face. I am wearing the necklace that we bought on our trip to the Braderie de Lille way back when and I've even got the straighteners out mid week.
It's a big day.
We meet at Sloane Square and it is roasting.
It's a lovely walk to the venue via the Peter Jones lav and FMH tells me that this area of London would be great to retire too, which I still say to myself every time the word London falls upon my ears.
She isn't wrong, it is far more appealing than assisted living in a Barret Development outside a market town with a shitty bus route.
Still not at the flower show we loose ourselves in the endless jasmine privacy bushes that guise the Chelsea residences.
Then we are in.
Heaving, it's like a Renoir on speed.
This is a picture taken from under the tree, we spend a good while under this tree and returning to it because despite it being leafy, its the only place to sit in the shade.
This white stuff grows all over the IOW, I can't work out if this plating is deliberate or just a bit that no ones looked at? Greyling bought me a packet of it's seeds, must get on that next season.
This is what £10 fish and chips look like. I love mushy peas.
Just for ref, two peppermint teas and a cardiac brownie, the best you've ever tasted comes in at over £7.
I think Chelsea gardens for sometime were very ordered and then if memory serves me rightly along came the very dashing Dan Pearson in the 90's who made things a little more wild, the TV show that I watched avidly was no Percy Thrower and I asked for the books at Christmas I didn't even have a garden!
I heard he was showing here this year.
But I wanted to see pom pom flowers in the pavillion.
Again fashions are changing and there are not that many of these displays left but what there is are whoppers.
A word of warning, this Pavilion is best tackled in 15 minute bursts because those blooms especially the Hyacinths as stunning as as they are, make your head spin and you sinus ache.
A cold pack and a tree for shade will defo be required.
I always underestimate a red geranium.So then we were off to find the Dan Pearson garden, queries were made, the book assigned to the High Viz was complicated. So we wandered a bit.
There was another oasis lets sit on a rock next to those ladies and decide if this hunt in this weather is worth it, hang on a minute, Champagne? we must be close, bloody hell I am in it!!!!
This garden isn't wild, this was scrub land, it's up on the rec, I am surprised there wasn't a red poo bin sticking out!
Amazing!
How do you get those flecks of old white paint, bits of paper and old leaf and petal, it was curated tiny litter in the grass. I am gobsmacked, round the other side it was lovely of course. Dumbfounded and lost for words we head for a tree and walk straight past the man himself, very tall and still very dashing.
Yes I know!!
Soon it was time for home, so sad to say goodbye.
At the end of it all, I wasn't that bothered to go again, but know in the last days of this December, warm weather, good company and all that colour is appealing. The best way to do Chelsea is with very little, no big bags to lug around, don't even wear walking shoes, just a credit card and a book for the train.
FMH Thank you for getting me there
xxxx
CM
