February 13 – Dandenong Range and Gardens

The Dandenong Range is very close to Melbourne and we decided to visit the range and the gardens there.  The first place we visited was the Ferny Creek Horticulture Society Garden.  Turns out is wasn’t really open but some of the members were working on cleaning out beds and they let us wander a bit.

Next stop was Cloud Hill Garden.  This was formerly a nursery but was eventually just reworked into a beautiful garden with many rooms and terraces and meadows and woodlands.  

We chatted briefly with the gardener.  Turns out there is only one.  It was amazing that one person could manage the entire garden.

The garden also had a lot of statuary.

Many of the flowers were in full bloom.

Our next stop, the William Ricketts Sanctuary, was very different. Oh my, oh my, this was a real find.  Buried in a cool, tranquil, serene forest this was truly magical and almost haunting.   

William Ricketts was an Australian artist and potter (1898- 1993) and he spent much time with aboriginal people.  His Sanctuary is where he maintained his home and studio and many of his works, most featuring aboriginal people, are scattered along the paths.   

Ricketts created the sanctuary as a place for quiet contemplation an replenishing the spirit.  The sanctuary reflects his philosophies about the connections between human, nature and the earth.  Very different and rather haunting.

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More photos of Ricketts Sanctuary
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As we were leaving the parking lot we saw a fairly large, white, scruffy looking bird in a nearby tree.  From a bit of research we think it is a laughing kookaburra.

From there we went up to Sky High, a lookout with great views of the valley below and the Melbourne skyline in the distance.

There was a small garden there also so we did a bit of exploring.

This evening we headed down to Hardware Lane, with its end to end restaurants, for dinner.  The weather was great and everyone was out in force, filling the outside tables.