The Traveling Gardener

Our mission: to catch our breaths after the ten day East Coast House and Garden Show! Ashley, Izolda, Gerald and myself headed for Port Elizabeth, destination Graaff-Reinet. So off to The Eastern Cape we went – fitting in so much over the 4 days, including the gorgeous Valley of Desolation, Nieu- Bethesda with its famous Owl House, and a bookstore with the best second-hand gardening books I have seen in a long time. Needless to say, I left with an entire box of new treasures to enjoy.

No visit to Graaff-Reinet is complete without taking a walk through the amazing garden of extraordinary collector Johan from Obesa nursery. What an experience and an honor to spend some time with such a wise man whose plant breeding has created the most spectacular crosses of succulents – of course some of them just had to come home with me – two full boxes of new plants made it back safely on the aeroplane and are now planted, joining my hundreds of other plants in the ever growing collection of succulents.

We were privileged enough to also visit Johan’s son Anton who is also an avid collector. Not only does he have a magnificent collection but oh my goodness his garden is something else – plants that make your mouth gape with pure amazement, plants that I have only ever seen in books, and a real maze of succulents and cactus species – wow wow – please do treat yourself to a visit!