You enter the garden by a bridge over the Curl Brook and meet the Stone Tower where water is raised from the stream by an antique water wheel supplying the water which spouts from the gargoyles at the top. It is also home to a flock of white doves.

The Bog Garden

Entering the main part of the garden over the Mill Pool you come to the Bog Garden, rich in water-loving plants. Paths cross the bog allowing a good view of individual plants. From the Bog Garden you may wander in any of several directions.

The Big Pond

Behind the giant cornus hedge that provides a screen at the back of the Bog Garden you come to the Big Pond flanked by massed groups of moisture-loving plants large and small. On one side are mainly giant irises and rushes, while on the other side you walk between the pond and the leat, the channel which feeds the mill, in the midst of exuberantly colourful primulas, hemerocallis, ligularia and other water-lovers.

The Cairn Garden

The rose Rambling Rector and wisteria festoon a pergola that separates the Cairn Garden from the Big Pond. In the Cairn Garden, boardwalks take you over a maze of small channels and luxuriant growth. A fountain bubbles from the cairn at the centre.

The Wild Flower Meadow

From the Cairn Garden you cross bridges over the new planting of the Cut and reach the Canal at the edge of the Wild Flower Meadow.

Follow a stream-side walk bordered by young trees and shrubs, then cross the Meadow to climb to the top of the Spiral Mound and feel like the king of the castle!

The Rill and the `Monet’ Bridge

Returning to the main part of the garden, you can cross the leat through a `tunnel’ under giant leaves of gunnera to reach the Lily Pond and the blue `Monet’ Bridge.

Meander along the Rill with its massed primulas backed by the Giant Cuckoo Clock in its mound of evergreens. On your right is the Orchard Spinney underplanted with a variety of shade-loving groundcover plants and shrubs.

• More of my photos of the garden can be found on Flickr

Albert Einstein