There are lots of reasons to travel and explore around the world, from local culture to ancient history and architecture. For nature lovers, botanic gardens and natural wonders can be a huge deciding factor in where to travel next. Insure and Go went to the trouble of researching the world’s favourite botanic gardens for you, so plant-loving tourists can plan their next big trip. And of course, Adelaide scored incredibly well, landing at equal 15th, in the list of the top 100.
Four and five star online reviews were analysed for 100 of the most popular gardens worldwide, revealing which gardens are most loved by the world’s botanical tourists.
World favourite, with 97.7% ratings being 4 stars or above, is the Boyce Thompson Arboretum, the oldest and largest botanical garden in Arizona, USA. Close in second place is the Plas Cadnant Hidden Gardens in Wales, which a score of 97.5%. This historic estate boasts three elaborate gardens plus tea rooms and holiday cottages.
Australian gardens did well in the rankings. In fourth place, the Melbourne Royal Botanic Gardens scored 96.9% 4 and 5 star ratings. The Sydney Royal Botanic Gardens came in twelfth with a score of 96.4%, and South Australia’s own Adelaide Botanic Garden is tied for fifteenth with the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden in South Africa, both scoring 96%.
As well as doing the math on the best botanic gardens around the world, Insure and Go also created a way to determine the best of 50 countries to visit for nature tourism. They achieved this by measuring the metrics of each country’s number of plant species, Google search data for each country’s gardens, and Instagram data for garden and plant related hashtags. The total area of each country was also used to assess how many botanical gardens can be found per square mile. A score was given for each of these factors, and a weighted formula was used to provide an overall ‘Botanical Bliss’ score for each country.
Australia ranked number 6 in the world using this formula, with a 73 Botanical Bliss rating out of 100.
So where should Australians travel to see even higher ranked countries? The destination ranking highest using this formula is the United Kingdom, which got a Botanical Bliss score of 79 out of 100. Its high score is largely due to the huge number of botanical gardens in the country, as well as the large number of people searching for gardens to visit across the country, including world-renowned gardens like Kew Gardens in London and Trebah Garden in Cornwall.
Next in the rankings above Australia is Japan with second place, the United States in third, India in fourth and Malaysia in fifth.
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