A green-fingered dad has kept cool this weekend as Britain sweltered in a heatwave - in the incredible back garden 'jungle' he's spent 35 years nurturing. Brits were warned to stay out of the sun from 11am to 3pm this weekend wear shades and a hat as the Met Office issued a heat warning.
The thermometer hit a sizzling 32.2c in yesterday and temperatures are predicted to stay high today. But Dr Simon Olpin's back garden is the perfect place to bask in the searing heat as it's an 8,000-square-foot tropical paradise complete with 25ft palm trees
Simon, 71, said: "It's very nice as we've got an area near the house that's very sunny. We can sit in the sun surrounded by palm trees, bamboo and some umbrella trees which come from South East Asia.
"It's a very green backdrop then further into the garden, it goes into the jungle as it has some more large, tall trees and a tropical hut. It's very tropical, it's certainly not like Sheffield - that's for sure.
"It's got a lot of Chinese Windmill palm trees and some of them are around 30ft (9m) tall. There's around 16 of them all around the seated area so it's a very tropical atmosphere."
Simon has been passionate about nature since he was a boy but due to his fear of flying, he has never been able to travel the world and see any jungles. So the dad-of-three has brought the jungle to his suburban garden in Sheffield, after planting his first tree from a ‘small pot’ back in 1987.
And since then it's grown to have more than 100 species of plants, with 25-foot palm trees which tower over the sprawling garden. Simon, a consultant clinical biochemist, moved to the house from Cambridge in 1987 and described the garden as a 'black canvas' that required a lot of 'trial and error'.
But the keen gardener said he couldn’t put a number on the number of hours or money he had spent perfecting his project over the last three decades. Simon said: "I have to keep everything trimmed and cut back because I get so much growth because the soil is so rich.
"There's a lot of birds that nest in the bamboo and in the palm trees. There's also frogs and toads in the garden because there's ponds around the area.
"It's quite good for wildlife because it's good for vegetation. I've chopped down a few trees over the years but I've just left them to rot so that gives places for animals to live.
"I'm basically maintaining a natural eco-system to keep things fertile and to keep things growing."
Simon's three children Holly, 31, Lily, 29 and Jay, 24, grew up believing tigers roamed their garden and that fairies left them letters penned on tree paper. But Simon's favourite part of the garden is the bit that makes you feel like you 'could be in the middle of the jungle.'
He said: "I think my favourite area is the bit which is surrounded by palm trees which is where we've got the seating area.
"It's very tropical. I like the very top of the garden which has got three very tall Eucalyptus trees, big bamboos, a couple of really big tree ferns and it's got a thatched hut.
"It's quite shaded so it looks like you could be in the middle of the jungle."
Simon has a deathly fear of flying which means he has only ever been on a plane once which he said was 'once too many.' This has stopped him from being able to visit jungles from all around the world so instead, he has visited ones such as the Eden Project in Bodelva, Cornwall.
Simon said: "I've never been to any of these tropical jungles but I've been to the Eden Project in Cornwall and I've been to a lot of gardens in Cornwall. They've inspired me really as they grow a lot of the plants I probably grow.
"But surprisingly, it was always thought that you had to live in Cornwall to grow these sort of plans but you can grow a lot of them over here. I would love to go to South East Asia and go to Borneo, Sumatra and Malaysia but that won't happen I'm afraid.
"I've been to Spain on the train and there was some really nice gardens down in southern Spain."
