Late Summer in Scotland
The Kingdom of Fife Gardens
Scone Palace, Drummond Castle, Teasses, Cambo, V&A Dundee
From the Norton House Hotel and Spa (4*) Edinburgh
1 – 5 September 2025 (four nights)
Another opportunity to enjoy a tour from the Norton House Hotel near Edinburgh with a new itinerary discovering gardens and houses north of the Forth. The hotel is an easy distance from the city centre, close to the airport and the Forth Road Bridge. The itinerary includes a variety of gardens with late summer interest with some recently visited by Monty Don’s “British Gardens” together with Falkirk Palace, Scone Palace and Scotland’s V&A Dundee. In Edinburgh, a visit to “Edinburgh's Sistine Chapel” and the National Museum of Scotland.
Monday 1 September: Shared taxis can be arranged to meet trains at Edinburgh Waverley Station in early afternoon. A taxi from the airport is a very short distance to the hotel. Dining each evening in the hotel.
Tuesday 2 September: The first garden visit is to Teasses. It is a privilege to revisit this magnificent garden developed over the last 24 years by the present owner and now extends to approximately 60 acres. In addition to the restored Victorian walled garden with fruit, vegetables, cut flowers and a large greenhouse, there are formal and informal areas of the garden linked by numerous woodland walks. Continuing to Cambo on the Fife coast where a light lunch will be included on arrival before enjoying the garden. The stunning walled garden has all year round interest and is constantly changing and developing with a variety of colour schemes and planting. The afternoon finishes with a visit the V&A Dundee. Designed by internationally acclaimed Japanese architect Kengo Kuma it stands at the centre of the 1 billion transformation of Dundee's waterfront. Discover the permanent collections and special exhibition “Garden Futures: Designing with Nature” highlighting ground-breaking gardens by visionaries like Piet Oudolf and Derek Jarman, alongside innovative work from leading artists, designers, and landscape architects
Wednesday 3 September: Returning to Fife for a visit to Glassmount House – a Scottish finalist in Channel 4's Garden of the Year programme. A densely planted walled garden with a Mackenzie & Moncur greenhouse and historical doocot. Continue to a Royal Hunting Lodge much admired by Mary, Queen of Scots. Falkland Palace with superb Renaissance architecture, an extensive formal garden and one of Britain’s oldest real (or royal) tennis courts. Light lunch in nearby hotel. Finally a visit Pitcurren House a garden transformed by the owners with fruit trees and ornamental trees cascading down the hills highlighted by areas of terraces, borders, and garden beds containing a collection of hydrangeas and shrubs.
Thursday 4 September: Following in the footsteps of BBC's “British Gardens” a visit to Drummond Castle. The gardens are one of Europe's and Scotland's most important and impressive formal gardens dating back to the 17th Century. The gardens were redesigned and terraced in the 19th Century and the formal gardens were replanted again in the 1950s but preserved many of the original features. The view from the keep is awesome! Then heading north towards Perth and Scone Palace. A place that breathes history like nowhere else in Scotland. Most famous as “The Crowning Place of Scottish Kings”. Stunning state rooms, beautiful landscaped gardens and woodland, a unique ‘tartan” maze of beech trees in the shape of the heraldic Murray Star. Light lunch will be provided on arrival followed by guided tour of the palace and time in the gardens.
Friday 5 September: Checking out of the hotel and into Edinburgh for a short visit to Mansfield Place – a 19th-century, neo-Romanesque church with a remarkable series of Renaissance-style frescos painted in the 1890s by Irish-born artist Phoebe Anna Traquair. Then a visit to The National Museum of Scotland a diversity of the natural world, world cultures, science and technology, art, design and fashion, and Scottish history, all under one roof. The coach will then drop at Edinburgh Waverley Station in time for train departures from 1.30 pm or the airport 2.15 pm and the hotel 2.30pm.
Price includes:
4 nights' accommodation, dining and breakfast at the Handpicked 4* Norton House hotel.
3 light lunches, refreshments where stated.
All entries, private garden visits and tours
Coaching and Heritage Touring Representative
Tour Cost: £1195 per person
Single supplement: £85 per night 4 nights (£340)
(Double rooms for sole occupancy - regretfully the single supplement is applied by the hotel).
Non-refundable deposit: £175 per person
Shared taxis can be arranged from Edinburgh Station on arrival – times to be co-ordinated.
Extra nights may be possible at the hotel please advise when making your reservation.
The hotel has good parking, indoor swimming pool and spa facilities
Heritage Touring reserves the right to alter the itinerary should it be necessary due to conditions beyond our control. Every effort will be made to maintain the spirit of the theme.
Hotel website: https://www.handpickedhotels.co.uk/nortonhouse
Each tour, unless stated otherwise in the tour details, includes welcome reception, hotel accommodation, dinner and breakfast, entry fees, guided tours and tickets where appropriate, lunches and refreshments where stated, professional guide and executive coaching.
You are asked to make your own travel arrangements to join each break at the hotel listed. We are happy to give advice and where possible organise shared taxis from a rail station to the hotel and where appropriate the coach will finish a tour at the station. However we cannot take responsibility for individual travel bookings.
We strongly recommend that you take out holiday insurance for protection against any cancellation charges, loss of deposit and other eventualities even for holidays in the United Kingdom and for emergency medical expenses and injury, death, repatriation home if travelling abroad. Heritage Touring does not offer or sell insurance but can give assistance in locating travel insurance companies. Travel insurance is mandatory for all passengers travelling abroad.