Royal Botanical Gardens

by Laila Kasuri - September 17, 2021

If you follow me, you know that my most recent posts were about gardens. Well, no surprises there ! Since COVID-19, searching for gardens has been my past time. And no surprises, I made it to the largest one in Canada - the Royal Botanical Gardens. Ontario’s Royal Botanical Gardens is Canada’s largest botanical garden. Designated as a National Historic Site, the garden covers over 2400 acres of wetland, field, forest & escarpment ecosystems across the two cities of Burlington and Hamilton. Not to mention, the Gardens are a registered charitable organization. The scale of the gardens is palpable even at the entrance when you are provided a map. We weren't able to see all of it, but did see some parts.

The main building, which is known as the RBG Centre, is the place to start! An interesting fact is that a third of the building’s materials were sourced locally and almost 100% of the demolition/construction waste was diverted from the landfill.

At the main entrance, there is also a gift store and restaurant at the indoor center. A number of halls can be seen throughout the building, and they are used for presentations or events, it seems. We went past these halls to make a visit to the main Hendrie Park.

As soon as you exit the center, you arrive at the gorgeous Hendrie Park, which has a number of things to see including the Rose Garden, which features a spectacular display of roses and companion plants. There is a cute little gazebo for photo opps. Right next to it is also the Turner Pavillion Teahouse where you can enjoy a drink or snack.

Within the park, is a wood paved walkway known as the Morrison Woodland Garden, which has woodlanders and native plants. There is a Story Walk just before it. It reminded me a lot of my time in Korea, where most of the trails were wood paved.

Within the park, there is a small manicured section with lots of flowers and public art as well, which lies to your left as soon as you exit the RBG Centre. Its easy to miss it, but just make sure to go up all the stairs you see! This section is part of the Dan Lawrie International Sculpture Collection. In 2013 Dan Lawrie, Hamilton businessman and Burlington resident, made a 10-year commitment to donating sculpture to Royal Botanical Gardens which has created The International Sculpture Collection. Through Dan’s generosity, this permanent collection grows in Hendrie Park each year, with the addition of new works from around the world.

Other sites within the Hendrie Park include the Healing Garden, which is a small area featuring a collection of medicinal plants, the Medieval Garden, which features plants of ethnobotanical value used in medieval times for medicinal, culinary, aromatic and dye purposes. This garden also features an analemmatic sundial (the visitor becomes the gnomon and casts the shadow). Other gardens in the Hendrie Park incthe Helen M. Kippax Garden which features native trees, shrubs, perennials and grasses along with their cultivars to add extra colour, the Lily Walk, which has a lovely display of lilies and popular perennials, the Veggie Village, the Hendrie Gates which lead to the Scented Garden.

One could spend an entire day in Hendrie Park, but alas, we had more ground to cover. After roaming the park, we made a lunch pitstop at the Greenhouse Cafe in the RBG Centre, which offers delicious food. Within the RBC centre, we quickly checked out the Mediterranean Garden which has plants from all the five Mediterranean climate zones: the Mediterranean Basin, South Africa’s Western Cape, southwestern Australia, central Chile, and southern California and Baja. Two landscaped levels showcase cultivars of native and exotic Mediterranean plants.

The other collection right next to this is the Cactus and Succulent Collection which showcases some thorny plants, as well as a small koi pond.

We had already spent a few hours doing this, so we knew we wont be able to see all of the garden. The next thing on our bucket list was the Rock garden, which was nothing short of spectacular, though reminded me of Vancouver's Queen Elizabeth Park. The Rock Garden has its own visitor center, amazing water displays, and other rock pathways.

Unfortunately, four or five hours had passed and we had yet to touch the surface of this giant garden. However, it is well worth it to get an annual pass and spend some weekends exploring this gorgeous garden(s) which also has its own nature trails, an arboretum, a playground for kids, a multitude of cafes, and many conservation areas within the gardens.