They visited many of the pleasures of the gardens, such as The Treetop Walkway, The Palm House and The Princess of Wales conservatory.

In addition, 2 students from each class were selected as winners by their class teachers with their winning photo or newsletter write-up.  See below for the winning entries – we are sure you will agree that these are stunning and engaging.

The Geography Department

 

The highlight of my trip to Kew Gardens was most definitely the Tropical Rainforest Biome. It stood out the most compared to the other greenhouses we visited. I've never visited a country with its own rainforest, but coming here really transported me to one. The colours were vibrant, with hot pink flowers and vivid orange buds at every corner. And the humidity was definitely a stark adjustment!

It was surprising to see the small pond that was made, with the striking lily pads and the terrifyingly large fish. The greenery that surrounded it was beautiful, with lots of unique leaf shapes and patterns. I would definitely visit again just to further explore this biome.

Alma Goraviciute (reflection)

 

My highlight was the Temperate House. It didn't seem much from the outside, but inside it felt as if we were transferred into a jungle.

What I liked most was seeing how many of the plants are extinct in the wild and only alive because Kew Garden has preserved and saved them from extinction.

It was just really cool to see how important Kew Garden is, not just a nice place to visit but a place that holds something so priceless and important.

Jun Hao Noel Shi (honourable mention)

 

The highlight of my day at Kew Gardens for me was definitely the sprawling variety of unique plants as well as just the shared joy and curiosity everyone had experienced. Having never explored a forest or visited any place with much more exotic greenery than bushes and oak trees, I found everything extraordinary, like the beautiful Golden Barrel cactuses that have thick spines to avoid being eaten or the Victorian amazonica waterlilies that can easily hold over 40kg of weight. However, I’ve noticed that people sometimes don’t really appreciate nature or may act indifferent towards it. And so, being in the moment when all of us just stopped and went, ‘WOW’, was truly an incredible thing and for once, it felt like we were all equally captivated by nature. Even now, I find myself still smiling when I think of the trip!

Sophia Li (reflection)

 

Our trip to Kew Gardens has been my favourite trip so far, even surpassing the Year 7 Docklands trip, which I really enjoyed!

Our first stop was the gift shop, which was really quaint with a variety of stuff to buy, from guides to poisonous plants (which I bought - better to be safe than sorry!) to elegant brooches.

Next, we visited the beautiful and imposing glass Palm House, which was simply stunning, albeit really, really warm; it was interesting to see facts about medicines and foods of the rainforest dotted around, and quite fun to find them in the dense foliage.

Later, after our lunch break, we visited the Princess of Wales conservatory (my favourite part!) and went on the Treetop Walk. I loved the biodiversity in the conservatory, with cacti and waterfalls and massive fish (the albino pacu) side by side – it was fabulous!

At the time, I'm ashamed to admit that I was terrified of the treetop walk because the worryingly long structure was swaying quite a lot, not to mention we could see through the gaps in the floor, but in hindsight, if I were to go again, it would probably be one of my favourite parts of Kew, with that beautiful view.

I loved the Kew Gardens trip and I know future years will too!

Safaa Abdul-Aziz - (write up winner!)

Click on the link here to view the Kew Gardens Photo Gallery.