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Our next garden tour adventure will be to Southern England and the Channel Islands from May 14 to 27, 2023.Many people have already booked a spot on this tour but there is still time for you to sign on if you'd like to join us. The hotels have agreed to save space for extra guests, but there is, naturally, a...

My next garden tour-adventure will be a 13-day Beautiful Cities Tour from May 17-29, starting in Berlin, then moving on to Prague and concluding in Vienna with a side trip to Bratislava in Slovakia.(AS OF JAN. 4, THIS TOUR IS NOW SOLD OUT)This tour will be a fabulous trip to some of Europe’s most beautiful, historic and culturally delightful...

Today, I’m pleased to announce two unique international garden tours - a 15-day one to Sicily and Malta in September, and a 14-day trip to Southern England and the Channel Islands in May, 2023.  They are both fabulous. You may like one more than the other, although some people have told me they intend to do both. Yes, the Sicily-Malta tour...

Today, I am delighted to announce the official launch of my next tour, the quirkiest, most eclectic adventure of them all, a 15-day exclusive Top to Bottom Tour, from Sept. 22 to Oct. 6, from Edinburgh, Scotland, to London, England.  Lake District to Stratford, Liverpool to Oxford and more: Tour will be a party from start to finish On the way,...

Pleaching is a clever technique that involves twining together the branches of a row of closely planted trees to create a stylish, formal hedge-on-stilts. It’s not something you see here in Canada or even in the U.S. much. But in Holland, and especially in France, you see it everywhere. Some of the best examples I’ve seen include rows of pleached chestnuts in...

My 15-day Ireland Grand Circle Tour was inspired by the desire to see more of Ireland - the parts we missed on our first Ireland tour in 2017.Seven years ago, we visited beautiful gardens in Dublin including Cork House, Knockrose and Tyrellstown as well as some of the finest gardens outside of the capital such as Powerscourt and Mount...

In 2017, I visited Ireland with friends, after being in England’s Lake District and North Wales.From Dublin, we went down the east coast to Wexford and Waterford, seeing some fabulous gardens on the way.It was a glorious adventure. The gardens of Ireland are simply fantastic, far better than I ever imagined. I am still talking today about how wonderful...

Dozens of people have travelled with us over the years - to China, South Africa, Japan, France, Italy, England, Ireland, Spain and on and on. We have done a total of 32 tours. Each time we go, we like to take a few group shots. Here are some taken over the years. Enjoy spotting your friends. Florence South Africa 2012 Lunch on...

We’ve just got back from a 16-day trip to Spain and England. So how hard was it, travelling in these Covid-scary times?Well, the first issue we had to deal with was literally making sure we could get on the flight out of Vancouver. On the London Tube with masks in place.It's the safest way. We were going to Barcelona via Munich,...

Laskett, the garden of Sir Roy Strong The decision to visit a garden is an important one. It's a commitment that starts deep in the soul, I believe, and it's a decision that is then manifested by the eventual physical walk to the garden. The process of getting...

The Garden Tours Reunion Party on Sept 2 - a celebration of the 22 garden tours I have led over the past nine years - was a big success. Eight-two people attended the event at the Shadbolt Centre at Deer Lake in Burnaby, next door to one of the nicest gardens in the Lower Mainland, Century Garden. The Cory Weeds Trio...

I love my garden tools. But there is one I love more than all the rest - my beautiful, multi-functional, never tarnishing, never deteriorating, never diminishing six-in-one hand-trowel. I love, love, love it.  And I’ve had it for years and years and years. So you’ll understand my alarm, my despair, my devastation when I stepped out into the garden...

Some friends brought us a huge bouquet of gladioli the other day - four bunches containing red, purple, orange and peach ones. They were barely in flower when they arrived, but they have since started to open up and we have placed them in two tall vases and they actually look very good. In fact, the more the flowers open,...

The Beautiful Cities Tour got off to a great start this week with all of us arriving in Berlin for the start of a fabulous trip that will take us to Prague and Vienna and Bratislava.In Berlin, we toured all the top sites from the Brandenburg Gate to the Reichstag and the Berlin Wall as well as key war...

Just to get those creative juices flowing as you step into the garden this spring and think, hey, what can I do that is new and fun and different. Here are a few silly, serious, fun and quirky ideas to make you think outside the box. Cup of alliums. Okay, too late to plant alliums, but how about a big jug of...

It’s been ages since I last saw my friends Lambert and Marjanne Vrijmoed, owners of Free Spirit Nursery on 32nd Avenue in Langley. I’m not sure why we haven’t seen more of each other over the past few years. I guess other things have been pressing in and we were away when they were here and they were away when...

The recent devastating dam disaster in Brumadinho, Minas Gerais, Brazil, made me think back to our visit to the region in 2013 to see Inhotim, the fabulous garden/art complex, located in the same area as the dam, just a short distance from Belo Horizonte. Dam disaster in Minas Gervais, Brazi

Some years ago, I was invited to see the Beaty Museum of Biodiversity on the University of B.C. campus.  I never got there, but I always regretted not making more of an effort. This week, Spring Break, I decided to remedy that and visit the museum with my grandchildren, Maya and Banks.

It’s been a few months since I stopped working at the Vancouver Sun after 38 years - although it was closer to 50 years in journalism as I started in newspapers in 1968 in England - but I still get asked the same question all the time: How do you like retirement? My answer is somewhat complicated. First, I have...

INDIA IN FEBRUARY Palace garden, New DelhiGarden tomb of HumayunClaridges, New DelhiChandigarh Taj MahalUdaipurTea pickers in MunnarSunset in Kerala Kingfisher on Arabian SeaOn Lake Pichola in Udaipur. ITALY IN MAY Pretty view on ProcidaCaserta Garden, NaplesPizza at Piz, MilanOn Isola BellaHappy hour in BellagioBosco...