Spring has sprung

yardinspring 114 640x323 Spring has sprungBryce’s arrival in early October was perfect timing. Gone were the cold nights and frosty mornings – we were opening up the windows and bi-folds to enjoy the warmer temperatures and cool breezes. So was our garden.

This winter was, by all accounts, an unusually cold winter. Our neighbour counted 21 frosty mornings this year (at one point 5 consecutive days!), compared to 6 the year prior. While cozy when sitting by the fire, it’s not ideal for the garden. But with that said, our plants did surprisingly well considering the requirements for a tropical garden. The casualties can be counted on just one hand.

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A tropical garden in the heart of winter

frost 101 A tropical garden in the heart of winterIt’s cold! This morning we experienced the heaviest frost of the year thus far, and while it makes the surrounding area look like a winter wonderland, it’s kept the fire working overtime, and us scratching our heads wondering why some of the plants are coping better than others.

Our goal has been to create a tropical garden to complement the plantation style home we’ve built, and as a we mentioned in a previous post, we planted a number of different types of plants in an experiment to see what might work, and what won’t. While we’re just entered the coldest time of the year, we’ve already had some interesting results.

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A day at sea on the James Craig

IMG 9177 8 9 tonemapped 2 640x370 A day at sea on the James Craig

I tend to geek out on the latest and greatest gadgets and gizmos, in an attempt to stay up to date on what’s new in the marketplace. Today however, I took a step back in time, and turned into a little boy on board the James Craig, a 3-masted, 19th Century barque from the Sydney Heritage Fleet. This was truly a spectacular day at sea – reaching around 8 knots at full sail in the waters just off of Sydney!

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