Sunday, 19 July 2015
On the evening of the Music in the Gardens tour day, I had found a handwritten note under my door. After some deciphering and pondering, I realized that it was from the owner of the Bohnke garden, which I had written about with well-deserved effusiveness a couple of years ago when it had been on the official Astoria garden tour. Because the Astoria garden tour had been canceled this year, and their garden had been one of the proposed gardens, Bob and Helen Bohnke had decided to go ahead and have a garden open anyway. I Googled to see if I could find any information to confirm this. (Bob had left me his phone number, but I hate making phone calls!) I found this letter to the editor in last week’s online issue of the Daily Astorian.
Oh my gosh! Now I was really determined to go. I made a screen shot of the letter and put in on my Facebook page in hopes that others would see it and attend. In the morning, I got a text from Rainyside Debbie Teashon saying that she was going. I’d texted Todd about it, but he did not get the message till evening. So off Allan and I went at Sunday midmorning over the Astoria Megler Bridge.
We parked on the hilly street in Astoria, and someone walking by said, “Are you here for the tour? It doesn’t start till noon, but he let me walk through.” It was 11:30, so we just started nosing around the edges.
The Bohnke Garden
(Bob later told us that chair had given way when he sat down with his morning coffee!)
From the lawn, I could see a memorial spot positioned at the edge of the garden.
There was so much to see that I did not feel at all impatient while waiting.
I asked Bob about last week’s garden tour, the one about which he had written that he was disappointed with the turn out. He told us that because of the Astoria tour getting canceled, he had just put up some signs on phone poles inviting people to come see his garden. I love that! I think it is a shame that the Astoria tour was canceled, and from what I have heard through the grapevine, there is no plan by the organization that used to organize it to hold one in the future, because they don’t need the money. If true….What does needing money have to do with it? Someone, who can get proper event insurance and who can use any profits to fundraise for a good cause, needs to step up and take on this tour, sez I!
I thanked Bob for finding my house and leaving me a note. He had just recently been alerted to my blog post of 2013 about his garden. I asked how in the world he had found where we live, and he said “I just went to Ilwaco and asked around.” I love that, too.
The side gardens of the house are as narrow as the ones in my Grandma’s house back in Seattle. I wish I had devoted as much effort to beautifying mine. It gives me ideas for the narrow-ish area between our house and Nora’s driveway.
I went out to the street to take a photo of the front of the house…
Then I went around to the back by going uphill, and around half a block and down the driveway to the apartments next door, thus avoiding steep steps.
The neighbours in the apartment building also enjoy gardening so they share a space by the parking lot.
(Fen’s Ruby is a nemesis of mine in certain gardens but here it is contained on the wall garden where it thrives.)
This little tour was a peak garden touring experience for me. Bob and Helen’s openness and hospitality in opening their beautiful and colourful garden sets a good example for all gardeners, and I am so grateful that he left the note telling us about it. I’ve sent him a friend request on Facebook; I hope he figures out that Flora Gardener is me!
I told Debbie that there was another garden in Astoria that I could show her. Being a garden tour nut like me, she readily agreed, so we headed east through Astoria to the Mill Pond village.