Port Alberni Garden Tour.

It was a cold and windy Mother's Day here in the Alberni Valley, but we bundled up and braved the elements to go look at the best my home town has to offer (in terms of green thumbs). The choice to move the tour to such an early date was a much debated topic (Alberni is about 2 weeks behind where it should be this year due to the unseasonable cold), so it was interesting to see people gardens a little before their prime. On the other hand, since so many of the homes had fabulous Rhododendron gardens, it was a good showcase for the earlier varieties.
Our first stop was Cherry Creek...home to many fabulous gardens. The highlight of this leg of the tour was a pair of houses that backed onto each other with shared constructed streams, and many other glorious water features. This stop also provided us with an idea for making concrete beds for the vegetable garden. See how the L-shaped beds makes access easier?
The unifying factor about the Cherry Creek stops was the scale. All of these properties are multi acre areas, owned by wealthy retired folk. Impressive but not practical as an example of what an average city dwelling Joe like myself can do. I really like the concept of diverting a stream into a constructed channel, running it through three waterfalls, and building gazebos next to tranquil pools, but as there isn't a stream handy, I'm stuck with no place to put my waterfall. It is nice though.















































The next grouping were the "in town" gardens. Three made the cut, but only one was truly worthy of a visit. The other two were a little too landscaped (mallscaped) for my tastes. Good suburban landscaping, but it was difficult to tell if the owners had a real knack for gardening, or just good landscapers.
The third home was a nice cottage style garden on a small steep lot. I would give anything for a small. steep lot. you can do so much with a hill. This place was also the only stop on the tour that had a good variety of perennials, the others relied a little heavily on landscaped features and shrubs (again the park sized yards were a factor). This place was funky, had two dogs, and was clearly inspired.

Also, it had a tree growing in it that by all scientific accounts should be dead...awesome!




















The final stops were in the mega wealthy area of Sproat lake...big homes with big yards. This home must of had over 500 varieties of Rhododendrons (but little else). It would also sleep 160 of your closest friends. Impressive, but again, out of my league.

All in all, a good day.