There is no way I am going out into my garden today. Winds of 70 – 80mph have been ripping through my garden since three am and still at it. Accompanied by lashings of rain that I am sad to say has found its way into the newly decorated conservatory. Very sad face.
But just to show that there is still a lot of colour here in Cornwall I managed to get some photos of the flowers and plants around Penlee Park in Penzance on Thursday, accompanied by typical Cornish mizzle I may add. But sometimes raindrops enhance a plant. And I used my new phone too as that is supposed to be waterproof, unlike my camera.
- One thing that I look for once the flowers diminish are the textures of plants. Luckily this far west we get very few frosts and so tropical looking plants survive outdoors all year round.
Melianthus
banana
Mahonia
Windmill Palm or Chusan Palm, Trachycarpus fortunei
Euphorbia
? - Another thing to look for is colour. England on the whole doesn’t do those bright brash colours, leaves generally turn yellow and then brown and drop off, unless you have maples or exotic American trees. But there are surprises like this shrub.
- Some flowers are still giving their all such as these colourful Begonias outside the Penlee Gallery and Orangery Café where you can get a very decent cup of coffee and cake and free WiFi. They even do breakfast and lunch too. And you can always go into the gallery for some culture.
- In the Memorial Garden I was surprised to find Azaleas already in bud and even flower! Though I had already been surprised by finding white Camellias in flower in the Morab Garden nearby.
- A clump of the white Japanese Anemone shone out in the grey gloom, looking pristine. My pink ones faded long ago.
- And the lovely dark red Sedum dies off beautifully.
As always, if you want a peek over other people’s garden walls then please pop over to our host, the lovely Jon, AKA ‘The Propagator’ where you find links to many more wonderful garden enthusiasts from all over the world. There might be a few soggy gardens this week!
See here for the participant’s guide.
Cornwall in Colours 
I like your banana plant, too. 🙂 🙂 Distressing about the conservatory.
Yeh, it’s been a real pain.
Love the texture plants and shots! And the multi=cploured fall foliage – reminds me of those rainbow popsicles we have here.
You are so lucky to have so many beautiful gardens within visiting distance. I miss that over here
My nearest gardens close over winter unfortunately, not these public spaces. I still have the George walk available.
Camera worked just perfectly . . and look squares everywhere! Wish though the same magic worked on your conservatory xxx
Indeed. Very frustrating.
Oh Jude – I’m so sorry to read about the Conservatory. Again. Still. You have to be feeling so discouraged after all the work that’s gone into its repairs 😕
I hope that otherwise – in spite of the winds and mizzle (I do love that word) – you are staying warm and dry.
LOVE the rainbow shrub! I’ve never seen one before. I wonder how it might like a Canadian winter 😉
It’s a darn nuisance Jo. Time and money spent and still no idea of what the actual problem is. I thought we had it cracked as it has been fine in recent wet weather, but in the hurricane force wind we had overnight there is obviously still a weakness somewhere! I sometimes feel like having it knocked down and start again, but I have feeling that still wouldn’t help!
😕
Oh no, I thought the leakage problems had been fixed. How annoying for you! It’s blowing a gale here today too, but instead of rain it’s brought a dust storm. All the top soil from out west will be blown out to sea. 😦
That sounds nasty. Australia’s climate is becoming very serious. We are simply drowning !!
There has been some great rain out west over the weekend. Let’s hope there will be more.
A wonderful colourful post, Jude. What is “this (multicoloured) shrub”? I like the collage of green too, with all those leaf shapes and water drops.
I have no idea what that shrub is, Jim thinks it might be a Tasmannia
Oh, and I hope you had a lovely birthday 💐 I sent a text but you have probably changed phone number since we met!
I have changed phone number. Thank you for remembering my birthday – 75, and I had to have a health check for my driver’s licence. MyQueensland daughter was here for a glorious four days.
Oh dear, so sorry about your conservatory. We had problems with ours for years, no matter what we did or several handymans tried to fix. It’s now mostly dry after a good job done by a firm in Norwich, but depending on the gale and the wind, we still detect a few drops. Very distressing .
Lovely flowers again. I especially like the close up of the Melianthus; the drops of water and the repetitive pattern from the leaves are awesome. x
The conservatory is frustrating, but we just have to hope we don’t have too many gales and rain from that direction. I mainly use it as a greenhouse as it is too cold in the winter months to sit in.
I’m very sorry your conservatory leaked. The shrub looks like it was hoping to get in on the Bonfire Day act. I’ve never seen one like that.
I can’t find what it is, I’m beginning to think I imagined it 😅
So frustrating that you can’t stop the water finding it’s way into your conservatory. So many flowers and so much colour in your Six. Just what was needed as a couple of frosts have seen off a lot of colour here.