We LOVE roses.  (Ok, Wendy does).  So, when we found out that San Jose had a public rose garden, we got very excited and couldn’t believe we were just finding out about it.  We had visions of a leisurely stroll through hundreds of blooming bushes, bursting with color.  We’d soak in the heady aroma while we researched which new specimens we’d like to add to our collection.  Given that we just moved and are starting all over again with no roses at the moment {sniffle}, this seemed like the perfect opportunity.  With visions of the great times we had picking out the perfect roses at the International Rose Test Garden in Portland and the Botanical Gardens in Wellington, New Zealand, we set off for the San Jose Heritage Rose Garden.

Finding the rose garden was a bit tricky, but we did finally manage to find a shady parking spot.  The parking lot isn’t big, but there was plenty of space on the Saturday afternoon we were there.  Parking and entrance to the park are free.  The rose garden is actually just part of the larger Guadalupe River Park and Gardens.  There is a sign with a map of the garden.  The roses are divided by the year they were introduced and organized in rings around a central courtyard with benches.  It sounds lovely and peaceful, doesn’t it?  Well, here’s the thing.  Actually, a few things…

The gardens were pretty over run with weeds when we were there.  Taking care of so many roses is a lot of work.  Work that’s done by volunteers.  We can only assume that there aren’t enough of them, or that they just don’t have enough time to devote to the garden.  The roses also badly need to be deadheaded, which means that many of them weren’t blooming (though they should be).

Even if those problems were addressed, though, there remains the issues with the location.  It’s right on a busy road, and there was a lot of traffic noise even on a Saturday afternoon.  Even that wouldn’t be so disruptive though, if it weren’t for the planes overhead.  The garden is right next to the San Jose airport, which is fairly busy.  Not only is it right next to the airport, though, but it’s on the flight path for arriving flights!  On the plus side, our children were very excited by the constant appearance of very low flying planes directly overhead…  In fact, this was their favorite part of the rose garden.  {Sigh}.