Balboa Park in San Diego filled with museums and gardens

The Museums and Gardens of Balboa Park

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The gardens surrounding the historic buildings in Balboa Park in San Diego are more enhancements to the buildings still standing from the 1915 and 1935 Expositions than strictly botanical gardens.

Botanical Building gives shade and fresh air

Botanical Building Balboa Park San Diego

Even the lath house, called the “Botanical Building” is primarily a visual showcase, rather than an educational botanical or demonstration garden.

Inside the spectacular Botanical Building, however, you will find thousands of tropical plants. Unlike glass greenhouses in colder climates, this lath house in the heart of Balboa Park is open to the air, but the laths shade the carefully tended plants inside.

Beautiful museums just steps away

The real center of focus are the many museums in Balboa Park. Happily most of the gardens are within easy walking distance of the Botanical Building. You can enjoy seeing them as you move from museum to museum along El Prado drive.

There are Angels’ Trumpets (Brugmansia) at the edge of a large parterre garden called the Alcazar garden. The flowers within the parterre squares change seasonally.

The desert garden and rose garden, reached by walking across an overpass, are okay. We have seen much better examples of both types of gardens elsewhere.

The collection of buildings built during the early 20th Century exhibitions and now housing museums are amazing architecturally. This one,right, is home to the San Diego Junior Ballet.

Just steps away are the Timken Museum of Art, the San Diego Museum of Art, the San Diego Museum of Man, the Museum of Photographic Arts, the San Diego Museum of Natural History and many others.