'It’s an easy audience here': Boris Johnson surfaces at Surrey garden

Fighting accusations that he was hiding from scrutiny, Boris Johnson made a largely unannounced visit to a garden in Surrey on Tuesday, questioning schoolchildren about their political allegiances and taking a walk around a lake.

“Oh God, he shook my hand,” said one Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) employee in Wisley, with apparent disdain. “Is he gone?”

The visit, part of Johnson’s secretive whistlestop tour of Tory heartlands, came after he was being questioned by Nick Ferrari on LBC about a photo of him and his partner, Carrie Symonds , and he made a visit to leafy Sheen, west London, for a walkabout, where not even the local Conservative Association had been made aware of the visit.

In telephone calls and texts, Johnson’s campaign team gave the Guardian the runaround over his exact location, leading the Guardian on a wild goose chase via Woking and the RHS headquarters in central London, before his team eventually insisted there would be no media access.

A taxi driver in Westminster, one of the places the Guardian mistakenly went, said: “I think he’s nothing but a distraction from the reality that Britain is currently facing. He is clearly trying to avoid the public, he doesn’t answer questions at all.”

Johnson’s team finally directed the Guardian to Richmond but declined to give specifics. Near the Tory party association headquarters on Upper Richmond Road, on the heels of Johnson’s cadre who had already departed, a painter and decorator who, like all other interviewees, did not want to be named, said: “He just said hello to us and waved back for about 15 minutes … I think he’s a good chap, he’s what the world needs, really.”

Another bystander, a thirtysomething Tory voter pushing a pram, was less impressed. “I don’t think he has been particularly truthful about his current romantic situation, and if someone does not tell the truth about their personal life then how can they be trusted in office?”

Johnson has been increasingly associated with gardens, from the scene of his now infamous photo with Symonds to his doomed Garden Bridge project, so the RHS garden in Surrey was an apt location for the next pitstop.

“I couldn’t believe he was wasting his time round here,” said a woman who had been having lunch. “He wanders in with an entourage, security, cars and cameras, instead of being where he should be … at the debate [against Jeremy Hunt] on Sky which he’s cancelled to come to Wisley.”

Her friend, a Tory member who said she would be voting for Johnson, said: “I don’t think he’s the man he used to be. He’s not conducting himself in the right way if he really wants to be PM, which is a shame because I don’t think there’s anyone else.” Stopping to collect her thoughts, she added: “He has changed, I do wonder if he’s going off the idea a bit.”

Despite it being in a constituency with a Tory majority of 17,000, most people to whom the Guardian spoke at Wisley were unaware that Johnson had come and gone. “I’m not a Boris fan but it’s an easy audience here, he’s a clever man – despite acting like he isn’t, quite often,” a woman said. “It’s all manufactured.”

Waiting to be told the location of the next stop, the trusted photographers following Johnson’s entourage admitted they found the tour sycophantic. “His first question and only question was: ‘Are you Tory members?’” one said, describing the team around Boris as “furtive”.

After receiving a tip about the next location, they left and apologised for not being able to take anyone with them. “Sorry, it’s all about trust.”

That location transpired to be Oxshott, an affluent village five miles away. Johnson bought £4.50 worth of fennel and tarragon sausages from the butchers, had a sip of tea in a cafe and drank a glass of water in a pub.

Those present said he refused to discuss the provenance of the Symonds photo and rejected suggestions he had avoided scrutiny. “People don’t want to hear about it,” Johnson told reporters. “It’s beyond satire.”