LONGWOOD GARDENS
Ever since the arrival of the Quakers, the Brandywine Valley has been known for its horticulture, and even today, the area's most popular attraction is a floral park - Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square.
Built by the Du Pont family in the 1920s, Longwood boasts 350 acres of
cultivated gardens (including a "fountain garden" where lightshows and fireworks are put on every summer), a four-acre conservatory and an elegant 18th-century mansion.
The heart of Longwood is the four-acre conservatory. Pull open its heavy glass door and be bedazzled by pink tulips, white lilies, blazing daffodils, delicate birds of paradise. The flowers change with the season, but the huge hothouse which rises up and around you like an immense cathedral - is always stuffed to the bursting point with luscious flowers of every description.
One branch of the conservatory is known as the Music Room, and throughout the year, concerts and plays are held on its marble stage. To its left is the wood-paneled Ballroom, which houses one of the largest organs in the world (10,010 pipes).
From its central hall, the conservatory branches out into endless small greenhouses, each one a treasure in its own right. There's the "Orchid Hut," for example, where purple, pink and white flowers grow in the air; and the ''Palm House," which looks just like a slice of real jungle.
Then, there's the "African Violets, Begonias, Food, Medicine" house, where you'll find plants bearing everything from glistening castor beans (poisonous in seed form, yet beneficial as an oil) to plump lemons and papayas.
THE BRANDYWINE RIVER
