Wednesday, 4 March 2015
On the way out of Ilwaco, I admired the crocus and tulips in our volunteer garden at the Ilwaco Post Office.
Before our job of the day, we had a somewhat ridiculous errand to run in Long Beach. About a week ago, we saw a white bucket by one of the east parking lot gardens. It had a label different from than any of ours but we had stopped our van and taken a look at it anyway, only to find it filled with dirty diapers. We were both repulsed and squeamishly just left it there, since there was no handy garbage receptacle to bung it into.
Yesterday, a guy who bikes around town a lot saw us working at Jo’s and told us we had left a bucket, so we realized the city crew probably thought it was ours. We meant to look for it on our way home and forgot. This morning, it weighed heavily on my mind and we went up to Long Beach to retrieve it, dirty diapers, some kind of oily goo, sticky handle, and all.
After putting it in our trailer to throw out in our own wheelie bin at home (because we decidedly did not want to touch the contents while putting them into a city trashcan), we were off to our last spring clean up job of the season. We are about a week ahead of last year in making our first visits to all of the gardens. We just paused to deadhead some spent narcissi in front of the Home at the Beach gift shop and to dote on the gorgeous Tulip sylvestris blooming in the same planter.
We got some coffee at the Great Escape drive through. Beth from the Anchorage Cottages was right behind us and asked when we were coming back there. I was pleased to be able to tell her that Anchorage is on our schedule for tomorrow because…YAY!…this was to be the last big spring clean up day.
Casa Pacifica
We spent the rest of the workday at our only job that is not on the Peninsula. (Well, Ilwaco is technically not on the Peninsula, either, but that’s another story.) Casa Pacifica is east out of Seaview; it only takes 8 minutes to get there straight from our house. Perhaps it is because it has no proximity to the bay or the ocean or the river that it seems so different a place than our other jobs.
We began by tidying up the big barrels by the workshop/garage that we pass on the way in. How strange it was to find calibrachoa (million bells) blooming on March 4.
Across from the workshop, we’ve planted narcissi and a few tough trailing perennials on an almost vertical bank of heavy clay.
Next, we worked our way along the long entry drive pruning sword ferns and pulling the native blackberry along the edge.
The dogs were all watching from the top of the hill; they are such good dogs that they wouldn’t come all the way down to the workshop area. When I was halfway up the hill, my good buddy Dusty and the shy Darcy came to see me.

further up: I’m pleased someone hauled off some fallen branches that would have hidden this ring of narcissi. (The top of this tree broke off last year.)
The main highway is just over that hill. Owners Dan and Leanne bought the place from a satellite view, not realizing it is a noisy road. My dog, Bertie Woofter, would have been right down that slope chasing cars. The Casa Pacifica dogs, Spook, Darcy, and Dusty, are such good dogs that they stay on the property. I would love to have a good dog like that.
Spook, a remarkable 17 year old rescued Great Dane, finally let me pet her on our last work day in November 2014. She remembered that we are friends now and no longer feared me, although it took a couple of hours before she came to me for pets.
While I worked the flower barrels and the narrow beds next to the house, Allan cut back the big pampas grass and pruned the downside of a hydrangea on the lawn island. (It pains me to work standing on a slope.) I came in after him and pruned the hydrangea, ferns, and a buddleia that are on level ground.
While Allan went to the back of the house to prune ornamental grasses, ferns, hydrangeas and buddleias on the raised wall, I did the damp little corner by the office.

before and after; I hope the Darmera peltata will come back in this spot. All the roof drainage seems to end up here.
The rock wall garden stretches in a gentle curve all along the back of the house. Allan takes care of this part of the garden because it hurts me knee to climb up there.
The rock wall garden needs mulch; it would show the plants off better to have soil darker than the brown clay. Any pile of mulch would have be dumped in the driveway and then wheelbarrowed past the house and up the far end of the slope. I’ll be 60 in a couple of weeks and I just don’t feel up to such a strenuous job. This is the year of house remodeling, so the garden is in sort of a holding pattern. I hope we can find a solution to the mulch problem in the form of younger backs and knees by 2016.
I chop and drop some of the plant debris here to try to add some compost; great big pruned dry grasses are too messy so Allan hauled them further back out of sight.
After work, Dusty and I took a walk round while I applied some Sluggo.
Finally, work was done and I threw the ball for Dusty.
Spook finally came for pets. Dusty, jealous as usual, kept pushing her out of the way so Allan threw the ball some more and I got Spook to myself for a bit.

He knows how to sit politely while waiting for the throw. Which is good because otherwise he knocks into me.
Allan used the Map My Walk application because he was the one who went up the the rock garden slope and also hauled the debris from all areas off into the woods. I find my mobility limited by the steep slopes in this landscape.

Map My Walk says Allan walked 5.57 miles and took 13,296 steps in 4.26 hours. (You can see how close the highway actually is to the garden.)
We had time to drive home and relax for an hour before going to dinner. It was hard to get back up after sitting down. We joined Fred and Nancy Aust, owners of the Basket Case Greenhouse, for Burger Night (takes place every Wednesday off season) at The Depot Restaurant.
Back home, I admired the work board. To the left of the empty “first visit” list is a list of projects. Still, I do like the look of this:
Next: In honour of another delicious Depot dinner, a slideshow of the Depot garden in 2014.
Seventeen years old! That’s ancient for a big ol’ Great Dane. They must be taking very good care of Spook.
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She is pampered.
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I had to google to see if it is even heard of for Danes to live that long and it is.
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I am glad that you were well entertained.
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