A Royal Park in London
London has 8 Royal Parks, ie parks that used to be owned by the Royal family. The largest of the eight is Richmond Park in south west of London and dates back to the 13th century. I used to go there very often when I lived nearby.
The park is over 2500 acres and is divided into many sections. It doesn't have pretty flowers planted everywhere as it is more of an open space and nature reserve.
One of the most interesting area is the Isabella Plantation, an area that has trees that dates back to the Victorian times in the 1830's. Isabella Plantation is about 40 acres large and is a beautiful woodland. It has many rare and usual plantations. It doens't matter which time of the year you go, there is always a different scenery as the plantation changes according to the season.
I love walking around all over the other areas park, especially the Pen Ponds in the center. It is very soothing to sit here in the summer and watch the ducks swim around.
One thing that Richmond Park is most famous for are deers. Deers have been roaming freely around here since the 17th century. Today there are over 600 deers here, and they help to shape the landscape of the park. You have to be very careful with the deers and cannot get too close to them. They are wild deer and different from the ones you see at Nara in Japan. I only managed to take the second photo by zooming in very closely with my camera.
In one autumn when I came here, I saw the male deers fighting over the female deers. Autumn is the rut season ie the breeding season, and the male deers fight with one another with the antlers to compete for female attention. I was quite a scene and I made sure I stayed quite faw away when I watched that. Sadly, I forgot to take any photos that time.
Finally, here are a few more photos of the different habitat and wildlife that I took during my visits to Richmond Park.
Location information
● Richmond Park, Richmond, UK
Related link
● https://www.royalparks.org.uk/parks/richmond-park/visitor-information
