I've visited the most wonderful Hosta place in Holland, the Hosta Paradise. Thanks to a very good friend who directed us there, we spent some delightful but sort of difficult hours at this very specialized nursery. This is the front of the little house: A glimpse from the owners' own show garden: The hostas were inside a huge greenhouse. This is the right-hand side, starting with A nearest to us and nicely sorted in alphabetical order. You can see the people walking there, right? The place is huge: And the left-hand side looked just as tidy and orderly, with Z nearest to us: So I just started my walk by A, went all the way down to the bottom, choosing plants as I walked, and then I had to have a coffee break and a snack before starting on that second half. I even had to ring my mother to check a few things out. The couple running the place had organized a lovely, little room with benches, chairs and tables, coffee, water boiler and some refreshments so the poor undecided visitors could have a sit-down and ponder their choices. There was also a bathroom, in case the plant picking really dragged out. Yes, I had to use it. I have to confess that we brought home more than we intended, and a lot less than we would have wanted, but with limited space inside the camping car we had to choose with a hard hand. I think we chose wisely, but only time will tell. So far I'm well pleased. As soon as the rain lets up, tomorrow or the day after, I'll be outside planting!
I'm just like you Droopy when I visit Holland. They have so many wonderful garden centres and speciality growers that you're really spoilt for choice. I'm glad you managed to get to spend time amongst all those gorgeous hostas. It must have been hard to choose a limited amount but I hope you got ones that you were looking for. WELCOME HOME!!!
It was a lovely day in all ways. Next time I'm going to Holland I'll have to bring a trailer, or a lorry maybe. The best thing about Holland is that it's so small, and everywhere is just a rather short drive away, so we can get around to lots of places if we want to.
Hosta Paradise looks like a place I'd love to go! I think I would have trouble deciding too. Any idea of how many different kinds of Hosta they had??
I have no idea, Netty. They've got 1001 different ones in their catalogue, but many were sold out. There were several hundred ones in that house I think. My head is still spinning at the thought of it. The main paths went top-to-bottom, but we also had to zig-zag across and back all the way down to the bottom on each side. Ouch, I'm no good at explaining things, really. :sigh: If they had half the selection they did have I'd still be spoilt for choice. I can't thank Sjoerd enough for finding the place and coming with us on the trip. It was such fun.
What a wonderful, homey looking place. I can see where a Hosta lover would have palpatations during the visit. Very nice that you got to meet with Sjoerd too, I imagine that was a fantastic visit. Did you get to see their gardens in person?
Toni, we had that privilege, and the photos doesn't do it justice at all. I could have crawled around there for days and still find something new and wonderful to look at. As for the fruit and veggies, well, they looked and tasted sooo good. Well, we had to do some quality control while we were there, right?
