Kentia palms were the classic indoor plants of Victorian times that decorated palm courts, even on the Titanic. Queen Victoria loved them so much she left instructions that they be placed around her coffin.
The palms all came from seeds harvested from Lord Howe Island, a remote island only 11km long far off Australia’s east coast where nearly half of the plants, including the Kentia palms, are found nowhere else in the world.
Towering over the island is a rugged peak, Mount Gower, whose summit is cloaked in mist and home to a cloud forest, an enchanting Tolkien-like world of rare palms, orchids and twisted trees draped in mosses and lichens, about 85% of which are unique.
The island paradise is a world heritage site that has been kept pristine for both its plants and wildlife, helped by a decision in the 1950s to limit visitor numbers to 400 at a time to prevent over-development. Biosecurity is tight to keep out pests and diseases, and nothing and no one arrives on the island without being scrutinised by a sniffer dog.
