I had cause recently to look up how many years I spent writing weekly for newspapers. EIGHTEEN YEARS, first for Taranaki Daily News, then adding the Wanganui Chronicle and finally the Waikato Times.  You could knock me down with a feather. It is so long ago that I started by faxing my articles to the paper. There are children alive now who don’t even know what a fax machine was and how magical it was for its brief office reign. No wonder I have such a big back catalogue of writings because on top of the newspaper contracts, there were shorter stints with magazines.

The high point was probably when a survey conducted by one of the newspapers had readership of the garden pages (where I was the main contributor) ranking higher than the sports pages. You would never guess that by the current invisibility of gardening in the media and the amount of space and time still given to sports coverage. But times change.

There are times, I admit, when I feel I have nothing left to say that I have not written before and I wonder what I can photograph that I have not shown before. Quite a large part of that is the result of our personal world becoming so much smaller. I have always relied on seeing gardens that are new to us, new landscapes, talking to more people for the stimulation of new perspectives. The last time we did a major trip overseas – I don’t count Australia as overseas – was 2017. Covid saw us cancel our 2020 plans.

I am flying off to the south of France in ten days time, via Barcelona as the closest airport to where our second daughter, her partner and their beautiful baby live across the border. I think it may be my last long-haul trip in the face of an uncertain future with climate change and geopolitical upheaval. I haven’t been to that northern corner of Spain or any of the south of France so I expect to be invigorated with new sights and experiences. We have scheduled Gaudi’s Park Güell for the day after I arrive.

In the middle of my trip, I am heading east, to what used to be known as the French Riviera. There I am joining a six day tour of the gardens in the area around Nice, starting with Lawrence Johnson’s indulgence called Serre de la Madone. Johnson is most famous for creating the garden at Hidcote Manor, which which just blew our minds when we first saw it, back in 2009 I think. At the time it was, quite simply, everything we aspired to with our own garden. In the years since, our directions have changed and I doubt that we would respond so intensely now but I have always wanted to see his French garden which is, I believe, very different to his English one.

I expect to return stimulated and inspired from seeing these largely classical French gardens with forays to Monte Carlo and across the border to Italy. Crossing borders in Europe never fails to delight me, as a New Zealander whose nearest neighbour is a minimum 3 hour flight away. I am anxiously watching the situation in the Middle East and the flooding in Dubai because I am flying that way. For overseas readers, to get to Europe or the UK from here involves two long-haul legs. We can do it via USA or Asia with with two flights of 12 hours each, give or take. Or we fly via Dubai or Doha and that starts with a non-stop 17 hour flight from Auckland, followed by a shorter second leg. That 17 hour flight is quite a lot … a lot of something, probably endurance.

Back to more local concerns: this path of pavers marks a degree of resignation to the inevitable. Ralph had established a speed track across the bed – the shortest distance out to the carpark. After all, he needs to respond quickly to any vehicle or strange voices because, you understand, he is never sure whether it is a maniacal axe-wielding man intent on doing harm or the lovely electricity meter reader who feeds him dog biscuits. Speed is of the essence.

I debated about trying to block him off but he would jump any barrier up to a metre high and the potential for injuring himself on bamboo stakes is pretty high. I think we can conclude Ralph won that round.