Petersham Nurseries

This post was originally going to be about Petersham Nurseries and Richmond Park, but the baby and the packing to move again got the best of me (and Blogger was no help whatsoever being down all the time). As you can see from the date I originally started writing this post up on the 8th of June. Yep. And then it occurred to me just a couple of days ago that I was being far too ambitious, that trying to sort, pick and post-process the pictures from Richmond Park on top of the ones from Petersham Nurseries was just going to be beyond my capabilities right now. In fact post-processing just the few pictures I picked from Petersham Nurseries was beyond my capabilities, so here they are unprocessed, except for their size.

If you happen to live in London or around the Western shores of it and haven't been to Richmond Park, let alone Petersham Nurseries, you must go NOW. OK maybe tomorrow or some day when the weather is nicer. But go as soon as you can, and if you go to the Nurseries, try not to drive, you can get there by public transportation (it's a whole thing with their permit to be there or something or other like that because zoning and permissions are an abomination to obtain and keep a hold of in this country).

Others have blogged about Petersham Nurseries before me, notably Keiko Oikawa of Nordljus and Shuna Fish Lydon of Eggbeater. They have a restaurant and a tea house there. Really that's just a fancy way of saying they are set up for dining in the hot houses and outdoors.

The food is lovely as is the setting, but it's all a tad more rustic than you would expect. We went there with Baby Saffron on a weekday when it was really hot and it seemed like a good idea to be sitting outside in the shade enjoying some good food and drink, but actually when we got there, even though the restaurant service was over, we weren't allowed to sit at the outdoor restaurant tables (Neither A. nor I really understood why) and since the other outdoor tables were all taken (and in full sunlight)and those that weren't were in a far corner by a crumbling wall with a bunch of construction and gardening equipment by them, we chose to eat in the hot house, which as I'm sure you can guess, was sweltering even with both doors and all the windows wide open. Not a way to win a new Mother's heart for sure, although they are wonderful nurseries if you're looking for plants and the food is great.

I'll blog later about Richmond Park which I just love love love (hanging out with the deer) when we're not in the middle of boxes and more packing and moving again with little Baby Saffron.