Parks and Gardens in Durham

For a small city, Durham is unusually green. The River Wear loops right around the historic peninsula, wooded banks run beneath the cathedral, and within a short walk or drive of the centre you will find a botanic garden, a National Trust garden, a hilltop Victorian park with the finest view in the city, and a grand Georgian landscape of lakes and follies. This guide rounds up the best parks and gardens in and around Durham. As ever, prices and opening times change with the seasons, so check each place before you go.

Durham University Botanic Garden

Tucked into the university's science site off South Road, about a mile's uphill walk from the Market Place, the Botanic Garden is one of the city's quiet pleasures. Its twenty-five acres of mature woodland hold plant collections from Chile, China, Japan, Southern Africa and New Zealand, an alpine garden and a bamboo grove, with sculptures dotted through the grounds and glasshouses of tropical, desert and Mediterranean plants (the tropical house also keeps stick insects, tarantulas and butterflies, which children love). There is a café, a shop and parking on site. It opens daily except over Christmas and New Year, and at the time of writing adult admission was £5.

Crook Hall Gardens

Just a ten-minute riverside walk from the centre, Crook Hall is a rare thing: a medieval hall with gardens, right in the heart of a city. Now cared for by the National Trust, which reopened it in 2022, its Grade I listed hall is surrounded by a series of themed garden "rooms", walled gardens and an orchard beside the Wear. The Garden Gate Café is free to enter even without a garden ticket. Entry is free for National Trust members; at the time of writing non-members paid around £10 for adults and £4 for children, and it is also a partner garden for RHS members. It opens daily through the main season and on fewer days as winter draws in, so check the National Trust website for the current calendar.

Wharton Park

For the best view in Durham and not a penny to pay, climb to Wharton Park on the hillside directly above the railway station, about ten minutes from the centre. This restored Victorian park is one of the oldest in the North East, and from its battlemented viewpoint, known as the Battery, the whole World Heritage panorama of cathedral and castle opens up across the valley. There is a heritage centre and café, an amphitheatre, a community garden, play areas, an outdoor gym and a putting green. The park itself is free and open around the clock, with charged parking by the entrance. It is a lovely spot to combine with arriving or leaving by train.

Hardwick Park, Sedgefield

A little further afield, about twenty-five minutes' drive south-east near Sedgefield, Hardwick Park is a restored eighteenth-century designed landscape and a proper day out. Its Georgian pleasure grounds are laid out around lakes and a serpentine, dotted with follies including the elegant Temple of Minerva and a 1764 Gothic Ruin near the entrance. There is a visitor centre with the Tower Café, a gift shop and accessible facilities. Entry to the park is free; at the time of writing parking was around £3 for up to two hours or £4 for the day. It is a peaceful, gently accessible place for a long walk by the water.

Rainton Meadows

On the Durham and Sunderland border near Houghton-le-Spring, about a fifteen-minute drive north-east, Rainton Meadows is a nature reserve run by Durham Wildlife Trust on a restored former opencast site. Its wetlands, meadows and lakes are excellent for birdwatching, with hides, accessible paths and a WildPlay area for children, plus the Trust's visitor centre and coffee shop. Entry to the reserve is free (a small parking donation is suggested, and the bird hides carry a modest day charge), and it makes an easy, wildlife-rich outing from the city.

Green spaces in the city itself

You do not have to leave the centre to find green. The riverbanks are Durham's finest free walk: wooded paths follow the Wear right around the peninsula beneath the cathedral, reached by steps down from Elvet and Framwellgate bridges. They open out onto the Racecourse, a broad riverside green used for sport since the eighteenth century, with a photogenic bandstand by the water. On the western edge of the centre, Flass Vale is a quiet local nature reserve of mature broadleaved woodland, wilder and less visited, and home to a Bronze Age burial mound. See our best walks in and around Durham for routes that link them together.

Making a day of it

Durham's parks and gardens pair naturally with the rest of a visit. Combine them with our guides to things to do in Durham and a weekend in Durham, and if you fancy venturing further, our guide to the best days out from Durham takes in the county's grander gardens and landscapes, from Raby Castle to Upper Teesdale.