Because of fresh blooms in the spring and sublime colours in October, those are the months that attract the biggest crowds, so there are actually less visitors to the garden during the summer. On a weekday, you will hardly run into another soul on the 92 hectares, leaving you free to discover the immaculately groomed lawns, paths, waters and greenhouses that are home to 18,000 different kinds of plants.

Summer is also the best time to visit the desert house in the Plant Palace, the garden's centrepiece of 13 interconnecting greenhouses, each with its own climate and region. Although it's a greenhouse, temperatures are actually not constant all year long. In the winter, the desert house is kept to a 25 degree minimum during the day, "but it would cost too much to keep the temperature higher," explains Koen Es with the garden's education department. "In the summer when the sun comes out, it can easily reach 40 degrees." And the cacti certainly like that. They are at their best right now, bright green and blooming.

Sadly, what you won't see in the Plant Palace this summer are the garden's famous Victoria amazonica, the largest water lilies in the world. The pond in which the awe-inspiring tropical plants grow is currently being renovated. Because they are annuals, meaning they die and are re-sewn every year, you won't find them back in full force until late next spring. "We put new seeds in the ground in January and fresh soil with a special secret fertiliser," explains Es. "Our gardeners won't tell what they use."

Curb your disappointment by doing the special walk "Planten op uw bord", or "Plants on Your Plate", at Meise until 31 August. A brochure leads you to a number of edible plants and tells you all kinds of facts about them, including a citrus fruit tree, cocoa beans and the juniper berry (used to make jenever). Some even come with recipes (unfortunately, not the jenever).

There's also a Darwin Trail, marked until the end of the year, which traces the scientist's work with specific plants, and an exhibition in the garden's castle called Diatoms: The Glass Lungs of Our Planet Revealed.

The bees are also especially active at this time of year at Meise, which might not sound like a good thing, but the bee hives, viewed through glass in a rustic cabin surrounded by wildflowers, have never been more lively.

Even if you have no interest in orders and genera and don't know the names of any plants to save your life, the botanical garden is simply a magnificent place to stroll or lounge about. The restaurant in front of the orangery lake serves up some beautiful salads, but you are also welcome to bring your own food and sit at one of the sunny (or shady) tables, with Mediterranean plants to your left, swamp cypress to your right. I've seen people plant themselves there with a book, a picnic basket and a bottle of wine and stay for hours.

www.botanicgarden.be