New house = nightmare, suggestions

We just purchased a new house in Visalia Ca (between Bakersfield and Fresno). We purchased a premium lot which is a 1/4 and we are wanting to plant it in tropical plants and palms. So far we finished the front yard in a more formal style with a 30 year old olive tree, 2 6 foot sago, 1 7 foot sago and 2 clusters of Queen palms with 3 trees in each cluster.
The back yard is a different story, we want to have a formal style section of the yard but we have a 40X60 foot side yard we want to make a jungle out of. Our nightmare begins wth trying to figure out what plants we can plant here with out them freezing. We have a handfull of day each year that we get in the high 20s and frost/ we wuld like broad leaf plants in various shapes and sizes. We are planing to move in a 25 foot Canary palm to serve as a a canopy and will cover a about a 15x15 area in shade.
I am looking for any ideas and what to plant for a year round tropical garden with higths of 2-15 feet in zone 9b.


Any ideas?

A few plants that come to mind are banana trees, brugsmania, and cannas. They are all hardy and have largish leaves. They will probably die back in the winter though, so they may not meet your criteria for having a year-yound tropical garden.

Check out Sunset Magazine's "Western Garden Book." The book includes maps that delineate the climate zones for California (and other parts of the West). It also includes an alphabetical plant index gives information on the cllimate zone for each plant. The book would be a great resource for finding out what plants are hardy in your area. Good Luck!

While Cannas are only a summer-time thing, I wouldn't be without them.

Evergreen ferns are wonderful too. My all time favorite fern is the mother fern, but there are so many wonderful choices.

I'm surprised you're in zone 9b though. It's not supposed to get down to the 20's here.

I would look into some Gingers, very jungle like and some smell wonderful! I think some will take a light frost.
http://www.floridata.com/ref/h/hedyc.cfm
http://davesgarden.com/pf/go/59481/
http://www.hardytropicals.com/Bananas.htm
Just a few I found by googleing "winter hardy ginger tropicals" Good luck it sounds like fun!
Caren