Join fellow Garden Lovers on exciting garden tours...

Join Cheryl Hedgpeth on a fabulous trip visiting riverside estates in New York. In New York City, visits will include a rooftop garden, theater evening, and the Frick Museum . We will explore Wave Hill, a 28-acre garden, overlooking the Hudson River, Brooklyn Botanic Garden , Vanderbilt Mansion with spectacular views of Newport Harbor, Rockefeller's Kykuit Estate, and two gardens in the Hamptons.

A Pacific Horticulture tour escorted by Katherine Greenberg. Portugal is rich in garden traditions since Roman times and influenced by Moorish designs and Portuguese explorations by sea. Come with us to experience the beautiful gardens and architecture of Portugal. We will visit exceptional homes and gardens featuring lovely tiles, water features, and sculptures. Our tour begins in Porto and ends in Lisbon, and along the way we will enjoy the best of Portuguese culture and cuisine. Join us for a memorable experience!

Join San Diego Horticultural Society members and friends on a fabulous garden tour to Portland, Oregon. Visit nine private gardens featuring creative use of plant materials. The gardens range from a small, exquisite, designer’s city garden, to artist, landscape architect Jeffrey Bale’s mosaics and stonework in his own “heavenly paradise”, featured in many magazines and books, to an urban farm complete with chickens, ducks, bees, vineyard and aquaponic herb garden, to woodland gardens and a quirky garden shown on Canadian television, where “plants and art mingle”.

Public gardens include docent-led visits to the Japanese Garden and the Classical Chinese Garden before they open to the public. We will also visit a few specialty nurseries.
Our hotel, the Inn at Northrup Station, was chosen for its location surrounded by restaurants, boutiques, art galleries, and museums. All rooms have small kitchens and the property is on Portland’s streetcar line.

The tour will be escorted by Portland’s radio garden guru, Mike Darcy, and is planned for a maximum of 42 people.

Join the Governor’s Club of Chapel Hill, NC visiting public & private gardens including Quatre Vent & Redford. This is a small group limited to 20 guests.

Our journey begins in Bilboa with the spectacular Guggenheim Museum . We continue to San Sebastian a beautiful seaside resort in the northwest of Spain famous for its delicious tapas. In Madrid we'll enjoy a walking tour through lovely Retiro Park with its lake and many fountains and private gardens. We'll visit Seville , with medieval streets and gardens - opulent, Moorish, Córdova, a World Heritage Site and Granada 's magical Alhambra with 14th century, Renaissance, Alcázar containing tiled court-yards & gardens, and the exquisite Generalife Islamic Paradise Gardens. We'll indulge in fresh, regional cuisine, a flamenco show and visits to. Indulge in fresh, regional cuisine, a flamenco show and visits to art museums.

A Pacific Horticulture tour escorted by Josh Schechtel, an exclusive gardening adventure to Victoria, British Columbia, sponsored by Pacific Horticulture. Spend three days visiting public and private gardens in the westernmost province of Canada. The relatively mild maritime climate produces ideal conditions for gardening. See examples of different garden styles and plant palettes that complement the rich native plants and dramatic terrain.

Acclaimed garden photographer, author Allan Mandell will present a slide show to introduce the diversity of gardens in Victoria.

Among the sites we will visit are the Abkhazi Garden, started in 1946; a wonderful Mediterranean garden featured in Pacific Horticulture Magazine; a sculptor’s garden and studio; and a whimsical collector’s garden in the oldest part of Victoria; as well as several other innovative private gardens. Enjoy private tours of the Government House Gardens, and Glendale Gardens and Woodland, both with large collections and beautifully designed grounds.

Our local escort is Valerie Murray, former director of the Abkhazi Garden and an expert on the gardens of Victoria. Our accommodations are in the boutique Hotel Oswego, centrally located near the harbor, many shops, and restaurants.

It is well understood that the nature of Japanese gardens differs greatly from those in the Western World. They are regarded as representing the universe and its elements, and expressing a specific philosophy. Some of the most highly acclaimed are those located in and around the ancient city of Kyoto. This fall a small group, limited to only 20 participants, will enjoy a unique opportunity to visit some of the most renowned gardens, temples and palaces in this region personally selected by Professor Lennox Tierney, current Curator of the Art of Japan for the Utah State Museum of Fine Arts, the Mingei Museum, San Diego, and Art Director of San Diego's Japanese Friendship Garden.

Professor Tierney is also the author of “The Nature of Japanese Garden Art”, in which he examines the Zen principles that relate to Japanese gardens, and the terms WABI SABI, which reflect the value of understatement and the richness of aging. On the tour he will provide a unique orientation and understanding of the many specific elements encountered in the places visited. In 2007 Professor Tierney received the Order of the Rising Sun from the Emperor of Japan for his services.

Join Allan Mandell on a photographers' adventure in Kyoto at the height of fall color. Kyoto, once the Imperial capital of Japan, is a treasure trove of the traditional arts. Garden making flourished here! Experience stroll gardens and small Zen temples, navigating through crowds and quiet back streets, urban density and forested hillsides, all in pursuit of bamboo, maple leaves, Imperial elegance, rustic Shinto simplicity, and the quiet within. Accommodations in a traditional ryokan, with side trips to soak in hot baths.

Enjoy being lost for awhile  ~  lost in color, line, pattern, creativity, and discovery. Bring open eyes, your gear, and a desire to explore Gardens of the Spirit.

Limited to 10 guests.

A three-night trip to Rancho La Puerta Spa. Relax with friends old and new, while enjoying the 3,000-acre property, offering world-class landscaped gardens, an organic farm, wonderful fresh food, yoga, mountainsides and meadows of great hiking and walking. The all-inclusive stay will include a private tour of the herb and kitchen gardens, massage, and special cooking class.

Join Jim Bishop and Scott Borden on an exclusive garden adventure to Hawaii’s Big Island. The island has eleven different climate zones with everything from lush rain forests to arid deserts, and black-sand beaches to snow-capped mountaintops We start our week-long exploration in the sleepy town of Hilo. Set at the foot of Mauna Kea, the world’s tallest volcano, Hilo’s centuries-old wooden storefronts house surprisingly sophisticated galleries, shops, restaurants and cultural sites. We’ve arranged a delightful mix of public and private gardens for our time on the east side of the island, including the world-famous Hawaii Tropical Botanical Garden, the home of television gardening guru, Tom Piergrossi, and the estate of the President of the International Palm Society.

After our time on the lush tropical side of the island, we will travel west along the foothills of Mauna Kea and into another world. While parts of East Hawaii can get up to 300 inches of rain per year, some areas of West Hawaii get less rain than San Diego. We’ll stay at lovely Kona by the Sea resort. Each unit has a full kitchen and balcony overlooking the sea.

We plan to visit an amazing selection of private gardens including a 25-acre rainforest 3,000 feet up the side of a mountain, a lush estate with a breathtaking view of the Kailua town, and a delightful garden and orchard overlooking Kealakekua Bay where we will be able to sample fruit right off the trees.

We will learn about Hawaiian history and culture at the Place of Refuge National Park where we may see sea turtles basking on the beach. We will also visit the famous Painted Church and picnic at the inspiring Paleaku Peace Gardens. And what visit to Kona would be complete without visiting a coffee plantation where we can sample this internationally famous product of the island?

Between the gardens and sights, we have planned some memorable and exclusive meals, including garden lunches and dinner on the beach.