I have been on a trip – this time accompanied by Joe Swift. We are going on Joe and James’s BIG adventure because we have been invited to go to Vancouver Island to participate in the Victoria Hardy Plant Study Weekend. This  attracts about 400 plant enthusiasts for a couple of days of garden visiting, shopping, chatting and talks – hence our presence. I have been here before to do a talk in 2012 – there is a rambling blogpost on the subject here.  The difference is that this time instead of pouring with rain  the sun shone with unusual vigour and snow capped mountains winked at us from across azure seas.

So, the programme is that we fly out on the summer solstice and arrive in Victoria late morning feeling a bit shagged out and weary. The temptation is to flop into bed but that would be a bit disastrous so we prop our eyes open and schlep off to visit the historic Butchart Gardens. I have been there before and found it admirable and a bit weird – it still is but at this time of year there are many more people all of whom seem to be taking pictures of every available garishly hued rose bush. It is spectacular but I think on balance I prefer the shadier, greener corners (of which there are many) to the seas of begonias. Eventually we get to the hotel which is delightful and situated in a small town called Sidney which is on the sea and close to everything. It is popular with the retired.

Day one involves fishing. This is because of Mr Swift who is a very keen fisherman. I thought I could maybe sit in the back of a boat and sunbathe while cheering him in his endeavours but no, this is a full participation sport. We wrap up warm and take a very fast speedboat across calm blue seas with snow capped mountains on the horizon. It is breathtakingly beautiful. We arrive at Pedders Bay to meet another boat into which I am transferred and given a fishing rod and some instructions – drop a line to a specified depth and jiggle it until you get a bite. I do not get a bite but the wise and experienced Mike (who owns the boat) does and passes me the rod. It is my job to reel the fish in without accident or mishap. It is quite exciting as he runs off and round and pulls and tugs in many directions. I must keep a taut line and my rod tip up – something that can get you in terrible trouble under other circumstances – eventually I bring the fish to a landing net and he is lifted out. However, there is no barbecuing or triumphant photographs because there is a size limit: anything over 85cm has to go back as they want to keep the strongest fish to spawn the next generation up the Fraser River. My fish is over 90cm so he must go back: I am quite relieved as he is very beautiful.

The best thing of course, is that Joe did not catch one so I have ammunition with which to taunt him for evermore. He did catch a large long cod but that is not quite the same. All in all it was a wonderful day and a perfect cure for jet lag.

Dinner in the Rum Runner which is very racy for Sidney as there is well tattooed waitress who is charming and recommends that we go to a strip club in Victoria. It is a sorry state of affairs when one is mistaken for a weary commercial traveler in dire need of a stint watching bored girls undulate. Or maybe it is flattering to still be considered enough of a party guy that people think that I am not always tucked up in bed by 10:30 and instead am habitually out on the midweek razzle.

The conference opens – it is in the Mary Winspear Centre which is a large hall at the edge of town. The gathering numbers about four hundred plant enthusiasts mostly from Victoria, Vancouver, Seattle and Portland: although there are others from as far away as South Carolina. The opening session is on Friday night and is begun by the ceremonial entrance of the Vice Governor who processes in followed by a large and bemedalled policeman. She makes a speech while the policeman smiles affectionately and tweaks the Bluetooth headset in his ear.

First lecture is from Cyri Hume, a local gardener who tells the story of his garden and the traumas and excitements of downsizing. This is followed by a slightly soporific talk about fuchsias before we are tipped out and sent off to amuse ourselves. Dinner at a little pier side cafe where I overestimate the capacity of my stomach and eat clam chowder, halibut, chips and a thing called a butter tart which is basically butter, sugar and sultanas in pastry. I walk back feeling large and slightly bilious. Sometimes regret tastes delicious.

Saturday morning  – the programme is that we start at 8:45 with a lecture, followed by a short break and then two more lectures before we have a boxed lunch (which, to be honest, should have stayed in its box) and are then driven off to visit gardens. I do the first lecture and people are very kind – I have never given a talk that early in the day before but it works rather well. The audience is rested and the caffeine is fresh in their bloodstream so they are less likely to snooze off. Following me are two good speakers, Tony Spencer on the New Perennial Movement and Egan Davis who runs horticulture courses and is amazing at digging. We end the day with a knees up and a large red and white cake at the Horticulture Centre of the Pacific – a handsome public garden just north of Victoria. Entre nous Canadian cake is (whispers) not as good as British cake: even though they all know exactly who Mary Berry is and revered almost as much as the Queen. Almost…

The gardens are great – some greater than others and one or two really good – and the people without exception charming, hospitable and delightful. Sadly we saw an awful lot of them and they have slightly blurred into one .

Sunday is the same pattern except that Joe gets the early shift and we do a double act to polish off the proceedings. In between there is a great talk about the fabulous Brooklyn Bridge Park by Rebecca McMackin who is a fizzy scientist. The park sounds amazing and she talked movingly about the effects of Hurricane Sandy when the whole park was dunked under three feet of salt water. We end with another party in one of the organiser’s gardens. Sometimes work is just one long slog….

The last day we went up to see big trees and very beautiful they were: a shallow river ran past them with baby salmon flickering through the pebbles in and out of the benevolent shadows from towering Douglas firs with hundreds of years on the clock. Peaceful as anything but in the autumn the great grandparents of these same fry will come up the stream to spawn – a last gasping act before they collapse exhausted to become food for bears and bald eagles.

Nice to get a bit of ancient nature before a long flight back home.

We fly across the Olympic mountains to Calgary where we hang around trying on camp cowboy hats while waiting for the connection. Home for a day then off on another adventure….. we might get two blog posts in a month you lucky people.

I am listening to Hold On by the Alabama Shakes. The picture is of the Olympic Mountains.

I have recently returned from giving lectures in Canada and the USA and thought that I would amuse myself by subjecting you to my mini-memoirs of the experience.

It is quite like being subjected to my holiday snaps except that I am not there so you can slope off without my noticing. The story begins on Day Two – day one consisting almost exclusively of travel by car and aeroplane. I cannot remember which films I watched on the flight but I know they were quite rubbishy. One of them had Jennifer Anniston in small shorts.

Thursday:

8:00am:I am writing this from the Holiday Inn Express in Spokane, Washington. It is quite sunny this morning and I have just eaten a warm sugary doughnut for breakfast – as a result I feel slightly buzzy and have nascent toothache. This combined with jet lag is an interesting combination.

3:00 pm: I have been whisked round the city by the extraordinarily eccentric (but equally extraordinarily charming) Meyer sisters (well, two thirds of the available collection) we have seen parks, undulating wheat fields, vineries, exterior dance floors,a conservatory and, the piece de resistance, the House of Meyer. This is an unassuming suburban house made notable by the addition of some breathtaking Halloween decorations and a large crane in the driveway. Halloween is a weird celebration and Americans take it very seriously: the hotel was covered in fake cobwebbery and there were themed parties (all this three weeks before the actual date). The Meyers take it one step further and have talking witch shaped automatons and a village of miniature electric models full of ghosts and skeletons. They get through an awful lot of sweets at trick or treat time.

10:00 pm: Back again having eaten a strange pizza that was crimped and folded so it looked like a Cornish Pasty and delivered a lecture to the well attended monthly meeting of the Inland Empire Gardeners. Seemed to go very well in that nobody threw anything. There was cake (i) as well as a treasurer wearing a very snappy leather kilt.

Friday:

9:00 am: Back in Spokane airport after a surprisingly weird breakfast consisting of a piece of round bacon and an omelette the colour and texture of a post-it note. Bought some grapes.

12:30 pm: I am boarding a bus. A rather well appointed bus with squashy seats and wi-fi. I have not been on a bus for ages. I used to travel by National Express when I was younger, it was never like this. Plastic seats and I usually ended up asleep and dribbling on my neighbour’s shoulder. I am here because I thought that if I flew to Vancouver I would see nothing. This way I get to see some trees, some water, a good slice of landscape and a lot of freeway. I am finding it rather delightful even though the skies are smoky grey and it drizzles.I passed a place called Chuckanut which amused me more than perhaps it should.

4:30 pm: Canadian Border. Had a long chat with the Immigration Officer about gardens. So much so that he forgot to stamp my passport and had to call me back. I feared it was a Gordon Jackson moment (ii) and I was going to be slammed in the slammer for some reason.

17:30 pm: Based on the scientific study I have carried out over the past hour it rains more in Canada than in the U.S. This may or may not be the result of global warming. Perhaps.

10:00 pm: Back in the hotel after eating a lobster. Tomorrow I must work.

Saturday:

9:00 am: Two talks to fabulous people from the Vancouver Hardy Plant Group in a comfortable theatre under a museum. It is still raining: which is good as if it was sunny and we were all stuck in a dark room then we would be disgruntled. Lunch was a sandwich of lamb and pear in bread studded with figs. Very jolly indeed.

3:00 pm: emerge, blinking to find the rain stopped and a glimmer of blue in the sky. Hurrah. Time for a swift visit to two gardens, some sea viewing and to realise than Vancouver is a very charming city before the rain starts again. Dinner was fun.

Sunday:

9:00 am: This is serious rain. I thought that we were kings of precipitation but we are not. I bow my head in humble acknowledgement that this is serious soak-you-in-double-quick-time rain. My theory is that each raindrop is approximately 25% larger than a British raindrop. Ergo the rain is wetter. I am waiting for the ferry to Victoria.The sea and sky are pretty grey which is a great pity as I was expecting spectacular views, autumn trees and possibly a few frolicking whales. There was conversation yesterday about high winds preventing the ferries from running. “It’s okay though, you can always take seaplane”. I don’t know about you but, if the wind is lively and when given the choice between big chunky ferry and small seaplane my choice would be with the former. Apparently not. I seek reassurance – “Most of the seaplanes get there okay” I am told. “But it might be quite bumpy”.

I do not like bumpy.

Bumpy is my idea of hell. Mind you so is nautical choppiness. My family has quite a long history of seafaring: we have salty sea dogs as ancestors. My great grandfather (a WW1 Cruiser Captain, later Admiral) was described in a book about the Battle of Jutland as having a face “like a scrubbed hammock”. I have missed the sea-going gene.

10:30 Many Canadians have rugged cases for their iPhones. Perhaps because of earthquakes.

12:18 pm: I have been on deck for the sake of research. I have used the opportunity to take some fine pictures of foggy islands for your amusement. I can now barely see properly as my specs are rained over. No whales but there is a large television over there showing an American Football game. One team is wearing neon pink spats with matching pink handkerchiefs dangling from the waistbands of their trousers.

3:00 pm: I have been whisked, via a sandwich, to the Salvation Army Hall in Victoria. Somebody’s car has caught fire in the parking lot and a man has just asked me if I was the Reverend in charge. The two events were not, I believe, connected as the man did not seem to be in search of absolution but you never know.

5:00 pm: I have delivered my fourth and final lecture of the mini-tour, as an added bonus I met a longtime commenter on this blog who I did not know was (a) Canadian (b) present in the audience (c) smiley (d) female. Nice to put a face to a nom de plume.
It is still raining.

10:00 pm:I have done two things this evening: I have eaten a large steak and have noticed that Canadian light switches work in the opposite direction to ours: on is down rather than up. I wonder why.

Monday:

9:00am: Typical. The sun is shining. I have just eaten a muffin of indeterminate ingredients for breakfast. I decided against the shiny hard boiled eggs. A peeled and naked cold egg can be a bit off putting. Mind you not many things look that appetising peeled, naked and cold. I am now going to see some gardens about which I will write on another day. I like to think that I know when my readers are at the end of their tether. Here is a decorative bin from Butchart gardens to whet your appetites.
It has all been very marvellous. Everybody has been a delight, I love lecturing over here.

Maybe someday I will get asked back.

I am now returned and am listening to Metal Heart by Cat Power.

Sylvia Kristel died the other day: my goodness she was beautiful. I was, I’m afraid, one of the many adolescents whose hormones she fuelled in the 1970s, I went to see Emmanuelle with a friend of mine when we were fifteen. Very young looking fifteen year-olds wearing ties. It was in the Prince Charles Cinema just off Leicester Square and we blagged our way into the afternoon performance. She had a tough time, very sad.

The picture is of some lettuce.
(i) American cake is different to British cake. Somehow it has more air in it, presumably this is something to do with the wide open spaces where buffalo roam etc etc
(ii) Classic Great Escape moment. You remember. Gordon Jackson and Richard Attenborough getting on the bus. All papers inspected. Gestapo officer as a parting shot says “Gut Luck”. Jackson turns and says “Thank you very much”. Bang. That’s it. Next scene they are all mown down in a field by a machine gun on the back of a truck. Moral: Manners can sometimes be a bad idea.