I feel like I’ve been to a lot of places in Britain that have boasted of a microclimate. And, as any self-respecting pedant will tell you, they are probably correct: “There is a distinctive microclimate for every type of environment on the Earth’s surface,” says the Met Office. But while we all love a windy upland, the areas that really get the juices going are those pockets of Britain where it feels unnaturally balmy.
It was when my daughter was so shocked by a wall lizard darting out from a rock that she stumbled backwards and sat on a cactus that I knew that Ventnor Botanic Garden (VBG) was the real deal.
