Garden tours & weekend adventures

Taken in London, October 2006

This weekend reminded me of wandering around public gardens in London as I came across some of the most amazing roses in both cases but in London they were at least labelled. I'm not sure if we can get this rose here but I remember that it had the most amazing fragrance. This weekend I came across other amazing roses but because it was all in private gardens, nothing was labelled so I'm not able to find them again.

The garden tour was on Saturday which was fine but there was a very cold easterly blowing. Most of the gardens had great shelter so we ended up almost too hot and I'm not complaining. My neighbour, Y., had organised the tickets and it was over in the West Melton area so the gardens were all very large. One of these days I must do a town garden tour so I can see how people cope with small sections.

But it was interesting. I found that the gardens I liked the best were those that were full of plants and had lots of nooks and crannies. One garden in particular was being set up in a grand scale and I found it to have no soul - it appeared to all be for show and it didn't feel lived in. First time I'd been to a garden where I've had that reaction! There were 5 gardens in total and we were to go around them in a certain order to allow the entertainment to happen. What happened for us was that we ended up going around them before the entertainment as it allowed us more time to browse without getting interrupted. It also meant that we missed the crowds (and mad drivers) which was an added bonus.

Seeing all those gardens did inspire me though. I came home and did some weeding before it started to rain on me. I weeded around my herbs that had disappeared into the jungle and when it came time to get the parsley on Monday night, it was easy to find. I must buy some pea straw this week to smother the new weeds that will now be frantically growing.

Sunday was a picnic brunch out at Waihora Domain. Once again it was a very cold easterly but once our friends had positioned their campervan upwind to block it, it became very hot when the sun came out. And yes, I've now had my first sunburn (extremely mild) for the season. Its not summer until I've been sunburnt. I am an incredibly slow learner! I carry sunblock in all the cars and I would say that I always put it on, except that I always get burnt at least once a season. Very frustrating as I have very pale skin and burn to a crisp in what seems like nan0-seconds.

By midday we'd decided to head off and do some Christmas shopping which was great. I got all my nephews and nieces presents and we were home again by mid-afternoon. I've still got a long way to go but at least I have the important presents done. We're planning on getting our Christmas tree this weekend as well. Very exciting.