Cholmondeley Castle Gardens

Cholmondeley Castle Gardens is a long, varied walk through more than 50 acres of ornamental gardens set inside a much larger historic park near Malpas in Cheshire. The castle itself is a private family home and is not open, so the day is all about the gardens and the parkland around them, which include two meres and a ha-ha.

The best known part is the Temple Garden, where an irregular pool holds two small islands, one topped by a temple, with a rotunda at the west end and a bridge whose parapets are formed of stone dolphins. The Folly Garden adds more water. From there you can move on to the Glade, the arboretum, ornamental woodland on Tower Hill and the Lavinia Walk, a long walk between double herbaceous borders named after the Dowager Marchioness who shaped much of the modern garden. The newest feature is the Cholmondeley Rose Garden, with more than 800 new plantings that make two connected rose rooms, one old and one new. Look out too for the 13th-century St Nicholas Chapel in the park and the wrought iron screen by Robert Bakewell across the main drive.

The Lavinia Walk is the place for border ideas, showing how double borders can lead the eye along a path, and the rose rooms are useful if you are weighing up old and modern roses. Families are well catered for, with tea rooms at the heart of the gardens, a natural play area called The Den, a children's play area by the mere and a lakeside walk. Expect to cover a fair distance, so comfortable shoes are a good idea.