An unplanned trip to California

We lost Andrew's mom on Christmas Eve. She wasn't sick, when she said goodnight to family after dinner there was no indication she wouldn't be joining them Christmas morning. It was a shock to say the least. Following our return from the Christmas trip to Spokane, Andrew drove down to Thousand Oaks, CA, to help settle the estate, I flew down a little over a week later for her funeral. We stayed there for a few days, and then took a rambling route driving home.

We stopped in Santa Barbara for a wander through Terra Sol...

Then drove up to Santa Cruz and the UCSC Arboretum and Botanic Garden, someplace I've long wanted to visit and was thrilled to finally get to see, although of course the reason for being able to visit tempered the mood.

The many South African Protea and Leucadendron were what I was most looking forward to. Like this stunning Leucadendron argenteum...

But the quantity and beauty of their many Australian Banksia are what I was most impressed by.

Banksia speciosa

Before we left Santa Cruz I wanted to get a better look at the city so we drove around a bit, as soon as I saw this I was transported back to 1987 and The Lost Boys. 

Serious déjà vu!

I had no idea the movie was filmed in Santa Cruz (fictionalized as Santa Carla) and was shocked at my immediate reaction. Who knew that movie was still floating around in my head?

Our next garden-related stop was the Ruth Bancroft Garden in Walnut Creek. Andrew had never been, and even though I was there last March I wasn't about to pass up the opportunity to visit again.

Since Gerhard (and his garden) were on our way home we made a stop there too. The visit was all too short (just a couple of hours) but included lunch and a garden walkabout.

The blooms on Gerhard's many aloes were oh so close to opening...

There will be future posts on each of these stops (and a few other things), but for now there is a haul to share. You knew I'd be writing about my haul right?

Let's start in the center of the above photo, with the three agaves on the white plastic lid. Yes they're Agave americana, yes that species is basically a big spiky weed, but they aren't common up here in my part of the world. When I saw this clump growing next to a bonsai studio we stopped at (yes, there will be a post) I asked the gentleman we were talking with if I could take a couple. 

He managed to not laugh when he said to go ahead (what crazy person wants one of those!?!). Interestingly the ones on the edge were growing right up through the asphalt.

Luckily Andrew was up for the task of removal.

The plants in the plastic tub are an unknown Stapelia, I'm guessing either S. grandiflora or S. gigantea, they were my mother-in-law's. Shirley was not a plant lover, or someone that even particularly enjoyed being outside. I remember being surprised when I saw this plant at her place when we visited years back, I wish I would have asked why she chose it, it's not an especially "pretty" plant (but I love it).

She had two large containers of them, too large to haul all the way home and they were in kind of rough shape anyway. I cut off the parts that looked good (a few came with roots) and will pot them up. 

The saguaro can was also Shirley's, we aren't sure if it came with her from Truth or Consequences, New Mexico—where she lived before moving to Thousand Oaks—or if she acquired it in California.

Gerhard, being the generous soul he is, sent me on my way with three pups from his "nursery," a variegated Agave geminiflora...

Agave parrasana (this one will go in the ground in the spring).

And this gorgeous Hechtia 'Wildfire', a hybrid by Andy Siekkinen. It was potted when he handed it to me, but shortly after that it attached itself to Andrew's shirt and popped right out of it's pot.

Next up, this metal basket from Terra Sol. Perhaps the very same thing could have been purchased here in Portland, but I saw it, the price was good, and I was inspired...so it became mine. 

They had an interesting selection of accessories at Terra Sol. The chain hangers were tempting, as were the terracotta pots (one of them is the same style I purchased from Flora Grubb back in '24).

These baskets were actually larger than the one I chose, they had five different sizes to chose from.

Here's what inspired me to purchase the wire basket, a display just a few feet away. I stared long and hard at a 3-tier shelf that had been lined with moss (or a coir basket liner) and then planted up with bromeliads, ferns, succulents, and who knows what all.

I'm envisioning my wire basket lined with moss (green Oregon moss) and planted up with ferns and bromeliads. There will be ferns growing out the side of course, because that's the best part. Perhaps I'll ditch the bromeliads for something hardy, that way I could leave the planting out year-round. Hmmm, lots to think about.

Next up in the haul, and also from Terra Sol, Russelia equisetiformis 'Yellow'. I've keep the red one alive since June '24 and I've coveted the yellow one even longer.

From Waltzing Matilija Nursery, purchased at the Ruth Bancroft Garden, Banksia blechnifolia.

I've grown this before, and wanted to try another one, ever since seeing it growing happily in a container in Dana Cromie's garden in Vancouver, BC. Funny thing though, when I looked up my prior post(s) about growing it (to check the date, 2014) it turns out I've attempted to grow it twice before! Ugh. Poor thing, third time's the charm though, right?

Last up, Blechnum gibbum 'Silver Lady', a dwarf tree fern. Thanks to my friends at Little Prince of Oregon I already have a small one of these, but the opportunity to have a larger one with a bit of a trunk (and at bargain price from Armstrong Garden Center) was impossible to resist.  

So, that's it for now on the California trip, but there will be several future posts!

The Bit at the End

The UC Santa Cruz Arboretum does have a New Zealand collection, but honestly I found it a little underwhelming. For a better look at the county's flora I've signed up for Emily Joseph's webinar via the Hardy Fern Foundation: Aotearoa: A Horticultural Journey Into New Zealand’s Land of the Long White Cloud. It's on February 26th, but there will be a recording sent out that you can watch at your convenience, and you don't have to be a HFF member to sign up! (more info here)

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