These stunning West Sussex gardens offer fun for all the family – come rain or shine

I chose a date I could make to visit the attraction in Lower Beeding, invited the rest of our family to meet us there, and looked forward to a beautiful spring day there.

And then the British weather threw a spanner in the works. As we counted down the days to our visit, we kept a check on the forecast and it was bleak.

Like so many days in 2023 so far, there was going to be heavy rain all day.

It was too late to change the date – when we meet my siblings and parents there’s 11 of us and we have to book dates we can all make pretty far in advance.

So, like the true Brits we are, we decided to brave the rain and make the best of it – brollies at the ready.

Unfortunately, Michael Fish wasn’t giving the forecast this week, and it was spot on. We drove up in torrential downpours (it’s an easy 30-minute drive from Worthing) which didn’t stop as we arrived and dashed into the welcome centre.

We decided to duck into the Clocktower Café to, hopefully, wait out the worst of the downpours and have an early lunch.

My husband and I shared an afternoon tea, which was delicious and I thought was fairly priced at £12.95. It was lovely there and we enjoyed seeing the resident peacock strutting his stuff outside.

We noticed the rain was easing and we decided to go for it. We’d just got to the front of Leonardslee House when it pelted it down again. We managed to get to the wallabies, and spend a funny ten minutes doing our best to shelter.

As it eased off again, we made our move to do a loop round the gardens. And do you know what, despite the gloomy grey skies and the need for waterproof shoes and a sturdy umbrella, we had the best time.

Would it have been nicer to stroll around in the sunshine – absolutely, but can you still have a great day at Leonardslee even if it’s raining - definitely.

Leonardslee only opened again in 2019 after being closed for 10 years. They were nearly lost for good, but a huge restoration project saved them.

And thank goodness it did, as it’s a beautiful place. Pathways zigzag the property, and every corner you turn there’s another pretty vista to be had.

Plus, there is the stunning sculpture trail, with huge pieces to view throughout the gardens. My favourite was Agape, a stunning woman’s face with a blue tinge to it (can you tell art critique is not my strong point?!).

But aside from Leonardslee being a decent rainy-day option, it is also the scene of, perhaps, my most rock ‘n roll moment ever.

As I was taking some footage of the gardens, a lovely man (who I now know is named Robert) stopped me and said ‘Hi, are you Katherine?’.

Quickly racking my post-two-children brain to wonder if this was, in fact, a great friend who I had temporarily forgotten existed, I agreed I was.

He then proceeded to tell me he recognised me from the pictures used with my weekly column, and best of all, he said he enjoyed reading it!

This beautiful moment was only slightly sullied when Robert said his favourite columnist was Monty, the old duffer who appears weekly in print in the Worthing Herald.

I’m only kidding, it was lovely to meet a reader ‘out in the wild’ and I loved telling my family I fell temporarily behind them because I’d been ‘recognised’. Fifty cool points for me!

We ended the day by looking at the dolls house collection, and stopping in the café for a hot drink and a cake.

Having managed an hour or two without rain in the afternoon, we felt pretty good, so didn’t even mind when the heavens opened again as we tried to leave.

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Leonardslee is a great day out for people of all ages. Some of the pathways are quite steep to navigate, but there is an accessibility map on the website, and a buggy service runs from the bottom of the grounds for people with mobility issues.

For more information, visit https://www.leonardsleegardens.co.uk/