Quickly dropped in to visit the Hunter Region Botanic Gardens [basically Newcastle NSW and surrounds] while passing on 13 Jan [2012]. They are located at Hexham on the north side of the Newcastle river beside the highway as you drive north or south on the pacific highway.

They are particularly interesting in that they are essentially of community gardens origin and have developed over time to be a more widely supported botanic gardens structure. Started in the mid eighties they have developed somewhat randomly over the years based on peoples interests and ability to contribute as volunteers.

The collection of plants is somewhat esoteric but interesting because of that. The succulent and cactus collection is really quite nicely laid out and holds a lot of interesting plants. They have a nice passive solar tropical orchid house of some size and a number of glass and shade houses.

There are a lot of really nice fundamental structural features and ideas that are still in development. They have some really nice parkland spaces and a variety of functional features like a small bush chapel obviously setup to cater to weddings and some nice lawns. They also have a tiny volunteer run cafe.

It felt good to see what a community garden could end up like.

note – The mosquitoes were severe and savage – they have a free spray yourself down area at the entrance with natural oil repellents – make sure you use it before walking anywhere in summer especially.

My pics here are of only really the succulent area.

http://www.huntergardens.org.au/