Trebah Garden Helford
Trebah Garden near Mawnan Smith on the Helford River in Cornwall is one of the finest subtropical gardens in Britain, a Victorian garden created in a steep ravine descending to a private beach on the Helford River whose collection of tree ferns, gunnera, rhododendrons and exotic plants from across the Southern Hemisphere creates a lush, jungle-like atmosphere of extraordinary richness. The combination of the ravine setting, the planting and the private beach at the bottom makes Trebah one of the most distinctive and most rewarding garden visits in Cornwall. The garden was created by Charles Fox from 1840 onward in a sheltered south-facing valley that descends approximately sixty metres from the garden entrance to the beach, the microclimate of the ravine protected from frost and wind by the surrounding woodland. The collection of tree ferns from New Zealand and Australia, some of considerable age and height, create the dominant visual character of the lower garden along with the enormous gunnera leaves that reach two metres across in the fertile valley soil. The private beach at the bottom of the garden, accessible to garden visitors, provides a sheltered bathing beach on the Helford River with views across the water to the wooded south bank. American troops of the 29th Infantry Division embarked from this beach for the D-Day landings in June 1944, a historical connection marked by a memorial in the garden.