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Exbury Gardens

Location

New_forest Map
Last Visited: 2008 View Google Map, Geocoding, Google Earth pushpin, what3words, etc.

Exbury Gardens is home to the world renowned Rothschild collection of Rhododendrons and Azaleas, and many award winning varieties have been bred here over the years.

Although at the gardens are at their most spectacular during the late spring, there is a large variety of mature trees, and plenty of interest outside the high season.

You can walk down through the gardens to the edge of the River Beaulieu (one of the few places where this bank of the river can be accessed) or ride on the really cool narrow gauge steam railway (see below).

Check the Exbury Gardens' website for opening times etc.

Exbury Gardens Railway

If your surname is Rothschild, and you want a train set, this is what you get. The Exbury Gardens Railway hit the headlines localy when the owner of Exbury House, Leopold de Rothschild, took his old friend The Queen for a ride round the gardens behind a new engine Mariloo he had just bought himself as an eightieth birthday present.

Following in the footsteps of such great eccentrics as Captain J E P Howey (Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Railway), Claude Lane (Seaton Tramway), W J Bassett-Lowke (Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway), and Sir Arthur Heywood (Duffield Bank Railway), "Mr Leo" may not have set out to create a commercially viable "minimum gauge" railway, but he has certainly succeeded in creating a very successful tourist attraction.