The gardens at Rockingham Castle are made up of several different terraces that are divided from the plain Terraced Lawn directly in front of the castle building by the Elephant Hedge – so called because they are sculpted to look like a row of elephants.
We moved first to the Cross Garden which was designed in the early 20th century with an armillary sphere in the middle of rows of plant beds laid out, unsurprisingly, in a cross shape.
The Rose Garden was probably the loveliest part of the grounds, though it wasn’t much in bloom in our visit in early spring. This is where the old keep would have been and the paths replicate the layout of the fortifications as they would have been at the time of the English Civil War.
We also explored part, though by no means all, of the Wild Garden which includes ponds and a lovely walk through the trees – there are much longer, and harder, walks through the grounds that we didn’t have time to explore. In fact I’d say you probably need to pick whether you want to see the castle and gardens or just the gardens and the larger grounds as the area is too extensive to explore everywhere in the opening times currently available. (You can purchase a ticket just for the gardens if you wish).
You can find more photos here.
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