In an English Country Garden... Quiz

Answer: Bedfordshire

The small village of Whipsnade is located on the edge of the Chiltern Hills in the south of Bedfordshire. For such a small village, it attracts an inordinate number of tourists, who come not only to see the spectacular Tree Cathedral but also to visit the famous Whipsnade Zoo. It is also the birthplace of Edward John Eyre, one of the early explorers of Australia.

Designed by Edmond Blyth, work on the Tree Cathedral began in 1932 as a tribute by friends who had been killed during WWI. Grassy avenues represent the floor of the cathedral, with stands of trees as the walls. Lime trees make up the nave, ash form the cloisters walk, silver birch the chancel and horse chestnuts the transepts. There are also numerous chapels, each formed by different tree species such as flowering cherry, Norway spruce, yew and Atlantic cedar.

Answer: Reading

Dedicated to the Virgin Mary and St John the Evangelist, Reading Abbey was founded by Henry I in 1121 and dominated the town for the next four centuries. It was largely destroyed in 1538, during the reign of Henry VIII and today all that remains is the inner rubble cores of most of the main buildings.

Joined to the remains of the abbey by the "Abbey Gateway" is Forbury Gardens on the site that was once the town's market place. Bought by the town as a recreation ground in 1869 the area was converted into a public park during the 1870s. The 31-foot statue commemorating the Battle of Maiwand, fought in Afghanistan on the July 27, 1880, was erected in 1886 to honour the losses of the 66th Royal Berkshire Regiment.

The gardens were extensively renovated thanks to a grant from the National Lottery and re-opened in 2005.

Answer: Cliveden

The political group who met regularly here during Lady Astor's time in residence were known as the "Cliveden Set" after then name of the estate. Prior to the Astor era, it was home to the 1st Earl and the Countesses of Orkney, the 2nd Duke of Sutherland, the 1st Duke of Westminster, and even Frederick, Prince of Wales (son of George II and father of George III).

The magnificent gardens include a formal parterre (at four acres it is Europe's largest) to the south of the house, an Italian-style "Long Garden" noted for its spectacular topiary, a maze originally commissioned by Lord Astor in 1894, as well as numerous temples, pavilions and follies. In the water garden stands the pagoda that was made for the 1867 'Paris Exposition Universelle'. There is also a substantial collection of statues, many of them collected by Lord Astor around the turn of the 20th century, among them eight marble Roman sarcophagi dating back to around 100 A.D.

Answer: Cambridge

The village of stands at the southern end of The Fens, just to the northeast of Cambridge. The village was home to the Augustinian priory from the early 12th-century until the "Dissolution of the Monasteries" in 1535. The name was changed to Anglesey Abbey in the 1600s. Now a National Trust property, former owners include Sir George Downing (founder of Downing College, Cambridge) and the Fairhaven family.

The grounds at Anglesey Abbey are particularly noted for their rose and dahlia gardens. With more than 50 species of wildflower, the gardens are a veritable smorgasbord for insects, and butterfly lovers will be in seventh heaven here, with many rare species regular visitors.

Answer: Cornwall

The village and civil parish of Mevagissey lies just south of St Austell, on the southern coast of Cornwall roughly midway between Land's End and the Devon border. The famous "Lost Gardens" completely surround the Jacobean-style Heligan House, built by William Tremayne in 1603.

After years of neglect, the gardens themselves were rediscovered (hence the name by which they are now known) and extensively restored in 1996, a process documented in a 6-part Channel 4 TV series. Now lovingly cultivated, they have become a major tourist attraction.

Answer: Chatsworth House

situated on the northern outskirts of the Derbyshire market town of Bakewell, Chatsworth House is home to a priceless collection of paintings, furniture, sculptures and books. Mary Queen of Scots was held prisoner here for a while. Although technically the property of nobleman and Royalist William Cavendish, the 3rd Earl of Devonshire, the house was occupied by both sides during the English Civil War.

Many features of the baroque-style gardens that still delight visitors today date back to the time of the 1st Duke of Devonshire around the turn of the 17th century. Highlights include "The Cascade", a set of stone steps down which water flows from the fountains at the top, "The Seahorse Fountain", and "Flora's Temple" which contains a statue of the Roman goddess of flowers by the noted 17th-century Danish sculptor Caius Gabriel Cibber.

Answer: East Sussex

Sheffield House is located just a few miles south of Gatwick Airport, on the extreme western edge of East Sussex, just across the county line to the east of the West Sussex town of Hayward's Heath. Dating back to at least the 11th century, the estate has a rich history. The 3rd Duke of Norfolk entertained King Henry VIII here in 1538. The grounds served as the venue for the very first international cricket match between England and Australia, in 1884 on a pitch laid out by the 3rd Earl of Sheffield. During WWII, the gardens served as the headquarters for Canadian armoured troops.

The Sheffield Park Garden dates back to the late 17th century when the estate was under the stewardship of Lord de la Warr. When Capability Brown laid out the formal gardens a hundred years later, he did so around a series of four ornamental lakes that still remain today. An arboretum of native and exotic trees selected specifically for their autumn colours was established in the 1880s.

Answer: Richmond-upon-Thames

Hampton Court Palace is located in the London borough of Richmond-upon-Thames, the only one of the city's 32 boroughs that actually straddles the river. Other places within the borough that attract large numbers of tourists from both home and abroad include Kew Gardens, Twickenham Stadium and the WWT London Wetlands Centre.

Originally belonging to the Order of St John of Jerusalem, Hampton Court Palace was purchased in 1514 by Thomas Wolsey, Archbishop of York and favourite of Henry VIII, but little of the extensive work Wolsey did to both the building and the grounds remains today. It was here that the 1604 meeting between James I and the English Puritans that resulted in the commissioning of the King James Bible took place. It was during the reign of William and Mary in the later 1600s that most of the major renovation was done, leaving the palace and grounds as they can be seen today.

The gardens wat Hampton Court were designed by disciples of the French landscape architect André Le Notre, who had designed the gardens at Versailles for Louis XIV. Structures built within the gardens such as William III's Banqueting House and the famous Hampton Court Maze remain much as they were when first situated.

Answer: Marquesses of Bath

Located between the towns of Warminster in Wiltshire and Frome in Somerset on the site of a priory that was destroyed in a 1567 fire, Longleat House was built by Sir John Thynne, ancestor to the Marquess of Bath. The success of Longleat as one of the major tourist attractions in the south of England is largely down to the flamboyant Alexander Thynn, the 7th Marquesses of Bath. Born in 1932, educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, this former President of the famous Bullingdon Club is a noted artist and writer as well as a successful businessman. Thynn passed the management of the Longleat business to his son, Viscount Weymouth, in 2010, but a rift between the two developed soon after when the son removed some of his father's murals from the house.

In addition to the spectacular Elizabethan country house, Longleat is home to more than 4,000 acres of parkland landscaped by the famous Capability Brown. In 1949, Longleat became the first English stately home opened to the public on a commercial basis, and the ground-breaking safari park opened in 1966. It is now home to more than 500 animals, including cheetahs (which arrived in 2011) and four lion cubs born on site in the same year.

Answer: Kent

Originally called Milkhouse Street (or Mylkehouse), the small village in south-central Kent changed its name to Sissinghurst in the 1850s. Like nearby Cranbrook, tools found confirm human habitation of the Sissinghurst area dating back to the Iron Age. In the 1500s, the village lay at the centre of a 700-acre royal deer park.

Vita Sackville-West, long-time gardening correspondent of 'The Observer', laid out Sissinghurst Castle Garden into a series of "rooms" separated by high clipped hedges and pink brick walls. Each room is distinctive in terms of colour and theme. Strategically-placed "doors" in the hedges tempt the visitor from one room into the next