A charity open day where historic gardens on Tenby’s Heywood Lane opened up to the public as part of the National Garden Scheme has been hailed a great success rasing over £1,000 in the process.

The National Garden Scheme gives visitors unique access to over 3,500 exceptional private gardens in England and Wales, and raises impressive amounts of money for nursing and health charities through admissions, teas and cake.

The day held last month saw John and Shari Argent at Scotsborough House and the Rhys-Davies family at The Grove next door open their ‘Heywood Gardens’ with a great amount of visitors coming along to support the charity event.

“Wow, what a success - everyone came together, the weather was perfect and the gardens looked amazing,” said Shari.

With the help of volunteers Janet Shughes and Dan White at reception, John and Shari were able to get around meeting, greeting and photographing as well as trying to answer millions of questions!

“The teas, can we say enough to the wonderful Helen James for her amazing teas and cakes? Gosh, I’ve never seen anything so lovely and inviting. And the other three gorgeous ladies delivering the teas and cakes, I can’t say thank you enough!” she continued, offering thanks to volunteer Mags Baker, Rosemary Rhys-Davies, The Grove Garden owner and Tina Phillips West Grove Garden co-owner with Julius Rhys Davies who was the greeter on the back terrace.

Next for praise came Clare Widdowson’s plants stand.

“Goodness, everyone leaving happily with their new choices and locally grown plants from last year’s NGS Open Garden the Retreat owned and lovingly gardened by Clare and husband Richard Rhys Davies of Penally. They were a star feature,” remarked Shari.

“Many thanks also go to the Tenby Observer which we believe brought in around 35 per cent of the locals including some from Narberth.

“Stars of the day were the gardens of course, along with the teas, plants and John’s ‘re-wilding’ spaces in the garden.

“Also, having so many local residents and neighbours see the gardens was just terrific and having eight young children was so nice.

“One of our biggest supporters came roaring down the drive stopping from one plant to another then came up to my husband and myself and said with a big thumbs up ‘your garden is beautiful!’

“We just loved that and learned that three and three quarters year old Billy Simpson, who attends Ysgol Hafan y Mor next door to Scotsborough, has just started a small garden with hydrangeas with his mum Nancy. Good gardening Billy!”

On the day £575 was raised from paying visitors, with extras from sales of Sarah Wint’s books, jars of their honey, teas, plants - bringing the total for the Open Day to £1067.00 for the Greenacres animal rescue charity and Many Tears.

“At this time, we have one more scheduled event on July 15 with the Pembrokeshire Branch of the Welsh Historic Gardens Trust, and we’ll wait until that’s complete before turning in the funds to the NGS,” said Shari.

“Once again, many thanks to everyone who volunteered and who attended the Open Garden and to the Observer for helping us get the word out to the community. It seems everyone reads the Tenby Observer!” she added.