Since posted here last have been picking up feijoas everyday we have buckets and buckets.
Bulbs have finally arrived, if you haven't got yours yet head down to Woodside they'll be in the shed in the basket. If you've got tulips, ranunculus, and anemone, best chill them in the fridge before planting out in May, since we don't get any of the white stuff in Aucks.
Last Sunday Garden Club went for our outing to Rose Lea in Riverhead. Let me report lest you be mislead, it is not a rose garden. The garden is ten years old and Liz and her late husband were the head gardeners presiding over a sandy brick house that's seen many grandchildren. It is a subtropical garden as you can see the palms and bromeliads and succulents take pride of place, along with a lot of Aussie plants like bottlebrush, grevillias, lomandra. The flowers she does have are more shrubs like vireyas, carpet roses, impatiens, camellias. It is beautifully landscaped in what was once a paddock with only one tree.
The house commands the top of the hill and is facing north, with a magnolia lined driveway leading towards the bromeliad and cycad decorated house from which a sunny lawn (it's dense couch grass) leads down to a sea bank of grevillia, with mosaics steps, toward a lane of weeping pears to the pond below. There are sheep grazing some of the paddock that was left. To one side of the house is an orchard with many different fruit trees, and beehives at the back. The courtyard that used to be the raised vege garden now displays succulents even in the glasshouse. Some ideas of her I'd borrow would be growing a plumbago in an obelisk, the cute little glasshouse with tropical plants inside, large shallow bowls to display rosette shaped succulents, a gazebo/arbour retreat with paving and painted rocks, and a mosaic sundial in the ground.
Liz says it's now very low maintenance, about the only thing she really needs to do is mow the lawns with a ride on and trim the grevillia and rescue the odd hedgehog, and give the sheep treats every now and again.
We enjoyed a muffin and cuppa in her sunny patio with a beautiful view of the surrounding countryside. She had hedges all around the property so was wonderfully peaceful and sheltered but it did not feel closed in at all because she had so much space (7 acres). Could this be the good life?
Afterward we convoyed on down to the Beekeeper's Wife bar and eatery which was buzzing with activity for a catch up lunch. I recommend the seafood chowder!
Am hoping this year we'll get to go to Rotorua on our big garden trip, and still, fingers crossed, if the fates are kind (or the govt, whichever) maybe even get to Taranaki for the garden festival. Here's hoping.
