Indonesia: The Botanical Gardens at Bogor

Seeking escape from the coastal humidity, in 1745 Governor van Imhoff located a site about 30 miles inland and at an elevation of about a thousand feet. There he built an estate he called Buitenzorg, "carefree." Fifty years later, in 1811, Java fell briefly to the British, and a young Raffles came to Buitenzorg and began to develop a garden around it. When the Dutch regained control in 1816, they continued the development of what became one of the great colonial plant collections. Although Buitenzorg is now called Bogor and has grown to a city of 700,000, at its center is still this remarkable garden, in remarkably good shape.