Where are you in Europe?

Ahh! That would explain it, GB seems full of oddities when it comes to geology, here we're surrounded by chalk on all sides but the forest is mainly on a sand or gravel base with acid clays.

When I did some conservation volunteering I seem to recall there were a few wildlife reserves dotted in the N. Hants/Surrey/Sussex borders.

Yes, lovely photo!
I used to live on the dip slope of the North Downs, so London clay with flints overlying chalk, but was fascinated by the greensand ridge. I'd travel up the long gentle dip slope, drop down the sharp scarp slope and then the land would rise again as the lanes climbed over that ridge, before reaching the Weald of Kent. The architecture and plants would go through transformations as you travelled along.

Your part of the ridge has certainly spawned some illustrious gardeners and landscapers Mike. What a lovely place to be, with different geology to keep life interesting ;o))
We were half an hour or so from Sissinghurst, though I believe that is in the true weald, and I have childhood memories of Vita Sackville-West greeting us visitors to her garden. Your area sounds fascinating with pleanty of 'wild' places to find plants and other wildlife.

Hello everyone!

I'm from Portugal. Here we have great weather (with significant variety throughout the country), and here in Lisbon there are hardly any years with severe weather conditions. Not too hot, never too cold (we had snow this year though!), not too wet or excessively dry. Humidity is ok.

However, gardening is not very popular, or at least not taken very seriously. So, whenever I mention my gardening passion people lok at me funny, like I'm a bit extravangant or something like that....

Our homes don't often have gardens and backyards are mostly used for barbecues and for the kids to play around - wich is just fine by me - and plants are looked at as being "too much trouble", "too dirty", or "good to atract all kinds of bugs".

Well, maybe that's all true, but it's worth it, don't you think?

I have a small (really small, 2 by 4,5 metres) varanda, and so I'm stuck with container gardening. Not that I don't like it, but I wish I had more to work on....

I love my apartment, it is fairly large and the view is terrific, but believe me, I'd trade it for a smaller place with a decent backyard any day!

Love to you all!

Ola MyHiraeth

Prazer em conhecê-la, seja muito bem vinda ao nosso fórum.!!!!!! Vc e portuguesa/?

Your English is excellent if you are...
Lizzy

Hi MH and a very warm welcome to DG!

Yes we're mostly hands on gardeners with dirty fingernails here LOL. So it's definitely worth it mmmmmmmmm
Hope you have fun and get lots of ideas by surfing around the site
I envy your sea views - I'm 2 hours away from the sea and would love to be closer.....

Olá!!!!
Obrigada pelas boas vindas, Lizzy! Sou portuguesa sim! É muito bom estar aqui!
Thanks for the compliment about my english, it's my other passion! :-) And I loved the post in portuguese, that was sweet! I hope you're having a good time in Spain, it's a nice country to live in! And your mountain view is something to die for!

Dear Philomel, thanks for your hearty welcome! I'm really enjoying this forum, not just for the information and ideas (and help!) but mainly for having fellow gardeners to talk to! ;-)

I must disappoint you, though. I don't have a sea view :-(. I live 15 minutes away from the seaside, and I don't get to see it from my apartment. But it overlooks Lisbon's biggest natural park, the Monsanto, to one side, and the whole city on the other. The Monsanto view also includes a gourgeous aqueduct and a palace. It is a wonderful view, perhaps as relaxing as the sea... It feels like you are on top of the world!

How's living in France for you?

Love

MyHiraeth

Welcome to DG MyHiraeth!

I hope you enjoy it here. I can understand about your restricted space, we gardened on just a balcony space when I was a teenager. At least here you can have a virtual garden too :)

I love it here partly because it's the least populated area in europe, though travelling for an hour to get to any decent shops is sometimes very frustrating. Fortunately I'm somewhat shopophobic (hate shopping) so only do it when absolutely essential.

The countryside and wildlife is superb and I never tire of the variety. We are a couple of hours from the top of the Pyrenees and also the Atlantic coast with lots of historical villages around.
Gardening is a challenge as the climate is so different from England (we've only been out here 2 years)

Your climate sounds wonderful!!

You have been very brave moving to completely new countries and they sound wonderful. I hanker for more sun, being nearer to the sea, better views etc, but haven't the courage to up-sticks and do anything about it. It would be very difficult to leave my plants and garden behind.

I too hate shopping and avoid it if at all possible. It seems to have turned into a hobby in this country, all the majority of people seem to do if they are not eating, going to pubs or having their nails done is going shopping - very sad. At least it means that the rest of us can go long country walks without meeting another soul for miles, and you can watch the wildlife without it being frightened away by loud chattering families, leaving a trail of litter behind them.

Grumpy old lady mode coming on - so I'll go over to the community allotment for a couple of hours to recover!

Hello I am new member and live in France about 35 kilometres north west of Avignon. The climate is not really mediterranean as we have very cold winters ( down to minus 12 last February) and hot summers (36 the top so far on a shady terrace.) I have two main problems .
One is trying to find colourful plants which will withstand the sun and the mistral..often plants which are supposed to like 'full sun' just give up. I am learning slowly (been here 2 years). The other problem is the naming of plants as often the names that my local nurseries give them do not seem to relate to any references I can find.
Two blue flowers I have just bought are 'Scaveolus' and 'Angel Face'. I have found photos of the latter but the plant I have has much smaller flowers than those in the photos. I experiment with how much water , soil, position etc but would like to know if anyone else has knowledge of these plants. Also if they are annuals or perennials. My local garden centre is a little vague on the subject.

Hiya,
I could repeat everything wallaby said but scroll up to find out about lincoln.
Cheers
Mike

A very big welcome to you both Laroque and Mike. We are a friendly bunch here at Euro-gardening!!! You will find many knowledgable and helpful people here.

I'm sorry that the only thing I came up with for any of your quests Laroque was that Scaveolus is also sometimes called Flag Plant but that info was not verified because the member is no longer existing to ask...a picture would help. Both Baa and Wallaby are the ones who I betcha will know these! Get Wallaby on that google thing of hers and what she can't find out about a plant isn't worth knowing!!!!!!!!

Look forward to seeing more of you both on the forums.

Cheers
Lizzy

Welcome to DG Laroque and Mike_Freck!

Laroque, your Angel Face might be Angelonia which is something sold/called Angel Face, they are tender perennials and rarely withstand any frosts http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&lr=&client=safari&rls=en-us&q=angelonia&btnG=Search

Mike Freck, beautiful picture, can't beat Livingstone Daisies for colour and vibrance!

Cheers Baa,
Both angel face and scavolea are used in hanging baskets here. Scavolea is the best, angel face seems to stop flowering every now and again. But yeah dead as ... once winter gets here.

Mike

Hello,
I'm also new to this site - I live in SW- Iceland in a town named Hafnarfjordur. It's about 10 min. from the capital Reykjavik, some would say that it's part of the greater Reykjavik area. Because of the naturally good harbour Hafnarfjörður became one the main trade harbours in Iceland and was the main harbour for German merchants in the 16th century. It was also an important fishing port from the late 1700’s.
Gardening in Iceland is a challenge to say the least. It takes a strong will and endless optimism. The winters are mild and wet with intermittent warm and cold spells and the summers are cool, with average temps. around 12°C so anything above 15°C is a bonus and temps above 20°C are few and far between (we call it our 5 days of summer - this year there have only been about 3 here in the SW). They often get more summer "heat" i.e. temps. of 15-25°C in the north and east but the winters there are also colder. This summer has been a lousy one by all standards in the SW following a very mild winter. By late April we were beginning to think that we'd gotten off easy this year but then came the cold spells that seem to hit every year just when the plants are up and growing – this year they were unusually late and harsh. June was miserably cold and wet (the first days in June most of the North and Eastern parts were covered in snow!) and when July 1st came around it felt more like June 1st. Now in late August fall is beginning to creep in - so as you can see the growing season is much too short! The main problem here (apart from the short growing season) is getting enough shelter from the wind without getting too much shade since most plants need all the sun (and shelter) they can get to grow properly.
I grow a lot of perennials many of which I raise from seed because the variety at the nurseries is limited and a lot of times seed is the only way to obtain a rare plant. Obtaining the seed is a bit tricky too - but being a member of the AGS for 3 years I've gotten my hands on some gems I've been searching for for years! I'm also a member of the Icelandic gardening society. I started growing roses after we moved to our current home about 2 years ago. Like the Icelandic summer the time when the roses are in flower is very short and precious - the earliest start blooming in July (Rosa pendulina starts in the beginning of July, the pimpinellifolias in mid-July and the rugosas late July) - but the showy ones, the old garden roses and modern roses don't start until August and many are just starting or still in bud when the first frost hits usually in late September- the Hybrid teas need a greenhouse to flower properly.

The photo is taken on the Hamar a cliff overlooking Hafnarfjordur - it's not the view from my house although I did live very close to there at the time the photo was taken. I now live in the northern part of town, just right of where the sun is setting. This photo was taken on June 9th 2003 at 11:40 pm - that's the up-side of living here - 24 hour daylight in June!

I have to say that I feel a bit envious of how good you all have it - Potagere, your photo is beautiful! I think you are very lucky living in such a gorgeous place! I think the Mediterranean climate of Spain and Portugal wouldn’t suit me – two years ago we got a heat wave in August with 20-25°C temps for over a week and we found it a bit tiring! But a slightly warmer and longer summer would be nice!

Hello Rannveig!

That is a beautiful sunset (or is it sunrise? but it does look COLD!!!! I can imagine that 24hours of daylight would make you want to spend your time in the garden making the most of it. A very WARM welcome to our forum - hope you feel at home here.

Lizzy

Weezingreens who gardens in Alaska would like to meet you! You probably have similar gardening challenges even if you are not on the same latitude.......without my atlas to hand I have no idea;)

Thank you for your warm welcome Lizzy - it's decently warm up here at the moment around 15°C (above average!) but rainy :-( I can't complain though since last week was sunny and warm! You're right I often wish I could just skip sleeping in June and make it up in December when it's dark most of the time (only 5-6 hours of daylight then). I've often stayed out in the garden until midnight; the latest was around 1 am. There's nothing that can beat that on a warm still night!

I guess the summers here might be close to Alaska although I don't know - but the winters are much warmer here. It rarely gets below -10°C. It's really hard to figure out what can be grown and what can't because I don't think there is any place that compares to it. The hardiness ratings only tell half the story; I'm in zone 7 according to minimum winter temps. but the summers aren't anything like zone 7. Plants with hardiness zone 4-5 usually do OK; zone 6 needs special care and I don't even need to bother with zone 7 plants. Also gardening is pretty new in Iceland. 100 years ago the only things grown here were potatoes, turnips and maybe cabbage. People couldn't afford to waste time and space on something as vain as growing decorative plants! There wasn’t much progress until around 1950 or so when a few very optimistic people started importing plants and trying them out. The oldest "forested areas" are from around 1950-1960 I think. When I was a child (1970's) the only "forest" I had seen was a pine grove with trees that were maybe 2-3 m high and I could walk between them if I ducked down a bit. I loved going into the "forest" which has grown since then so now we can walk up straight through it! (There's an Icelandic joke that goes - "If you ever get lost in an Icelandic forest you just have to stand up to find your way!")
So there are still so many plants that haven't been tried yet - I guess that's what makes it interesting ...it's always a treat when we find out that something can be grown that we thought couldn't. As an example I have an Acer palmatum plant growing outside that has only been sold as a greenhouse plant here. I had it in a pot that I took inside my greenhouse during the winter but last summer I was getting tired of moving it back and forth so I decided to risk it and plant it outside. Last fall I tucked it in for the winter with a shelter of burlap and it turned out just fine this spring despite the windy cold spells in May! That was a real treat! Of course last winter was unusually mild (I don't think the temps ever dipped below -5°C) so I still don't know if it'll make it through a regular winter.
The photo is taken this morning in my garden :-)


This message was edited Aug 23, 2006 10:45 AM

Wow! And greetings from the UK rannveig,

Gee, your winter was milder than ours! We had -9C in a greenhouse, so colder outside, quite a lot of frost to -5 or -6C, more than usual but years ago it did seem to be colder in the winter. Winter Jan -March 1982 we had 3 months frost and snow with temps to -20C, not the norm, the last 15 years or so do seem to have been milder.

Our summers are often not above 20C, sometimes lower, sometimes higher, this year it turned from being very cold up to June and then turned very hot, with temps over 30C at times.

Your garden looks great, very much like the type of plants we normally would grow here, but I am venturing into the more tropical. I guess that would definitely be out in your cool summers. Delphinium normally has well finished by now, I see you do have a very short growing season! You must be an inspiration to others there.

I haven’t introduced myself yet, I am fairly new on DG.
I live in Gent (Belgium), which is a historical town, known for its medieval aspects.

I have a tiny town garden of barely 100 m2, which was originally a dump when I arrived some 15 years ago. I had a hell of a time to make it into a little oasis.

It is hallucinating what some people dump into their garden! There was no soil worthy the name.
It was smelling bad and the place was littered with bottles, glass and plastic, socs, sweaters, nylon stockings, broken glass, plastic bags, etc..etc.. Even at a depth of 1 meter I still found junk among the stinking soil.

The best solution would have been to let the topsoil being removed by heavy duty machines, but there was the practical problem that the garden is situated at the back of the house, so there was no way to give access to these machines.
But I didn't let myself being put down by it, as I was so happy to have for the first time a little piece of land.

The very first thing I did was starting to dig out a pool.
It took me years before I succeeded to get rid of all the bad stuff. Each time I introduced a pant , I digged a big and deep hole, moved out the bad soil and replaced it by good potting soil.

My biggest frustration is lack of space, as I love so many plants.
Luckily my brother has made me a little terrace on the first floor which gave me the opportunity to extend my possibilities.


A picture of my tiny oasis

and one of my terrace on the first floor, which is my artist atelier (I'm a nature painter and photographer).

Wow bonitin your little oasis is stunning!

Thanks wallaby1 I've only been working on this garden for 3 years so it's still a work in progress but it has definitely improved since we moved in! Las winter was unusually mild - not the norm at all - there was very little snowfall and my girls (3 and 7 years) didn't get much chance to go sleding. The way this summer turned out I'm hoping for a proper winter this year (following a mild fall - fingers crossed) so we'll get a decent summer next year!

Here's another photo of the garden - that's my "bed of roses" under the south wall - they're so small you can hardly see them - most of them are new. 'Abraham Darby' just finished - no trouble spotting it when it's in full bloom. I hope it survives the winter and puts on another show next year.

Here's a photo of Abraham Darby I took last week :-)

Thanks Rannveig!

Your garden looks very luxurious and rich!
Amazing how mature it already looks after only 3 years.
The coulours and textures of the plants you've used are so well combining !

Thank you bonitin, to me your garden also looks very luxurious - almost tropical compared to what I'm able to grow!

Well the garden is older than three years - the oldest trees are probably around 30 years old I'd think. I've only lived there three years and when I moved in it was mostly grass with shrubs around the house and a hedge around the edge of the garden. I moved a great deal of perennials with me from my old garden and had to start cutting grass and making plant beds for them all - a lot of work and I'm still slowly expanding the flowerbeds on the grass's expense! I've also moved almost every shrub that was there to a new location, there are a few that are still in their original place but they are also on the moving list for next spring ... lucky for me my husband is willing to help me out although he can't always understand why I have to keep moving things around ;-)

Here's a before photo to give you an idea of how things looked when we moved in, taken in May 2003

Amazing Rannveig, what a metamorphose!

The 'before' picture shows a dull '13 in a dozen' garden .

Thanks! Yeah it wasn't quite my style!

I gather from your description that your garden got a big facelift as well!

This message was edited Aug 23, 2006 5:17 PM

Hi guys, nice to see lots of new faces in the European forum, and it's really interesting to see and hear about others 'problems' with heat/cold etc...

rannveig your photo of the sun reminede me of a holiday we had a couple of years ago we called into a few ports up the Norwegian coast on up to the North Cape, then over to Spitzbergen all in almost 24 hour daylight, it was so surreal , but the colours in the photo capture the mood really well. the oddest thing was on Spitzbergen there was a greenhouse with toms growing in it, goodness knows what sort they were .I love the sea-holly you have in your border too. We're hoping to get around to doing the trip to Iceland in the next few years, a place I've always wanted to visit.

Bonitin, I just love the dense foliage, it's a bit like how I like to have mine, I love looking out of the doors and windows seeing plants and birds and animals, my bedroom window is by now almost half covered by my climbing rose, I can lie in bed and watch the birds hopping from branch to branch.The down side being that theres also a lot of creepy crawlies too that stroll on into my bedroom, I have a nice huge green cricket on my bedroom ceiling at the moment.Those I can cope with, it's the big black hairy spiders that I freal at !!...LOL

Iceland is my most favourite country. We have family friends in Rekyavic. The houses are really colourfull. Not sure i could live there without my tropical plants.

Sueone, I think a visit to Iceland is well worth it (in my unbiased humble opinion) lots to see, I think the best time to visit is June or early July to get a taste of the bright summer nights.

Mike, you'd have to build a greenhouse or conservatory (they're really popular here - hope to get one someday so I can grow grapes!) for your tropical plants ;-) How can you grow tropical plants in the UK anyway?? You do get winters down there although I'm often green with envy when I see the temps you're getting on the weather reports. Do you move them inside for the winter or what? I visited the UK 10 years ago, went to the Kew gardens and it was magical. It was in early June and the Rhododendrons were blooming and I couldn't believe how big they were. I was also really impressed with the big bearded irises I saw growing everywhere - I really wish I could grow them here.

Most border line stuff will grow here aslong as its kept out of the wet in winter. If there are any english plant seeds you want please let me know and i'll try my best.
I can recomend the Raddison hotel Sueone.
If you like scenery you can't beat Iceland.
Mike

How wonderful to see so may new people on the european part of DG
..............and what lovely places you live in!
A warm welcome to all of you, mike, laroque, rannveig and bonitin.
The photos you've posted are great thanks. It's so good to see everyone's patches!

I had a holiday with my mother travelling around Iceland in a smallish ship, so we called in at many places the larger boats can't visit. We were there in June during a heatwave of 80C and were so taken with the fascinating scenery and amazing geology.
We also did the up Norway and up to Svalbard(Spitzbergen) another June sue. Again in 80C!! Anyone wanting to holiday in sunny weather should check when my mum is going on holiday LOL. The Lofoten Islands were a magical sight, the colours were just superb.

Great to see someone else in France laroque. You're further east than me, but we've been here about the same length of time. The different climate and soil etc has come as rather a shock to me. Need to learn how to garden all over again.....
I was almost up your way on monday bonitin - went to Calais to meet my son and family who came over from the UK for a day trip. i tried out my new camper van and am very pleased with it (fortunately lol)

I'm looking forward to hearing more about everybody's different corners of europe

Hello to all the new members. It is fascinating to see your gardens and get to know your gardening challenges. The main one is usually the weather isn't it?

The mention of growing tomatoes in Spitzbergen reminded me of the variety Sub-arctic Plenty from the Heritage Seed Library, which was bred for the American troops in Greenland during the war. Don't know what it tastes like though.

I wonder if we will have someone from every European country soon. I'm surprised there's no one from Italy or Germany, or have I missed them?

Pat

Wow philomel you are sure lucky with the weather on your travels! I'm not too familiar with Farenheit so not sure what 80F translates to but that's really good weather in Iceland whatever it is! The annual heatwave we're starting to count on came in early May this year (a week of 18-20°C weather followed by temps below 10C and close to freezing at times). It was a bit too soon; the schools weren't out and no one on holiday yet. I was hoping for an encore in July or August but no luck :-(

Thanks Mike_Freck for the seed offer! BizzyLizzy was right you are a friendly bunch!

You all seem to do a lot of traveling! I didn't realize Iceland was becoming such a popular travel destination (can't be the weather)! I lived in Florida for 7 years as a teenager and there people didn't know anything about it - thought we lived in igloos! lol :-) But that was before Bjork ....
I still haven't seen much of mainland Europe apart from Mallorca,Portugal, and two weekend trips to Mainz, Germany and Prague - Hope to get a chance to do more traveling someday. I'd love to visit France - I still haven't been to Paris! What I find very interesting are all the historical buildings (and the plants)! We were still living in sod-houses when all those castles and palaces etc. were long built in Europe! The oldest houses here are just over a 100 years old.
Sorry I'm rambling on like this - I'm just so happy to meet people that share my interest in gardening! I don't know anybody that's as hard hit as I am ... I think I'm in very good company here :-)

Pat, there was someone from Germany on the canna forum recently, not a subscriber though.

Also someone from Italy I saw in the seed exchange forum.

I did try those tomatoes, they weren't prolific but I only grew one plant, the fruit was a good flavour but fairly small. I decided not to grow them again, I was trying out different varieties from Totally Tomatoes when they were selling here.

Rannveig, you are right that most people think Iceland is covered in snow all year round. I've seen programmes showing it in summer and it looks very green, but I was surprised by how "English" your garden looks.

It must be very difficult trying to grow vegetables or fruit with such a short summer, but your flowers look lovely. Are the trees in the forests short because of the wind? or do they just not live long enough to get large?


I got quite a few different varieties of tomatoes from Totally Tomatoes, I like trying the heirloom varieties. My favourites this year have been the Abe Lincoln, Sun Gold and Cornu des Andes. I've got lots of new ones to try from the international tomato R.R for next year and we got to keep lots of seed from the seed saving course last weekend. Tomatoes Irish Gardeners Delight, which are much sweeter than the ordinary ones, and Costoluto Fiorentino.

I'm totally smitten with Cornu des Andes - such a wonderful flavour and, because of its shape, so much to use and so little core to cut out.

Yes, you're in the best gardening company here rannveig!
If you can get to France we will be very happy to welcome you here in Gascony rannveig! There's usually room out of season...
I so enjoyed my few days away travelling to different parts of the country. You're right the old buildings are superb

I think the wind is the main reason there aren't any real forests in Iceland. Although I'm not an expert on the subject, I think there are very few natural forests in Iceland, maybe in 2-3 locations and those are birch forests with trees that reach a few meters in hight. Most of the wild birch trees in Iceland grow more like shrubs and hardly reach more than 1-1.5 m - hence the joke about getting lost in the forest. So people believed for a very long time that trees just couldn't be grown here - then it just turned out that the birch trees are just of this bush type cultivar that doesn't grow any taller even in the best conditions. I think forest growing efforts didn't really start until around 1950's or '60's although I'm not quite sure, so when I was growing up the trees in the "forest growing areas" just weren't old enough to make a real forest. They are getting taller, I think the tallest trees are now about 13m in hight. Not much by international standards but really huge here.

About growing vegetables, well I'm not an expert on that subject either - If it doesn't flower I'm not inclined to grow it (with the exception of Hostas and other plants with decorative foliage). But from what I've read in the Bulletin from the Icelandic garden society there are many fine vegetable gardens to be found with surprising variety. I think people just have to be careful to select varieties that mature early. Fruit on the other hand is pretty impossible to grow unless you have a greenhouse. There have been many efforts to grow apples and cherries and even pears I think with very limited success. I have two apple trees growing in my garden that were planted by the former owners - one of them has flowered twice (one cluster of flowers both times), but no apples. I know that some people have gotten a few apples, but very small though. Maybe the right cultivars just haven't been found yet - who knows maybe we'll be growing apples and cherries one day. I really wish that cherries could be grown here because they are soooo delicious and very rarely available in the stores (and if they are they are very expensive) Fruits and berries (and vegetables too for that matter) are a luxury item here and I think Icelanders eat a lot less fruits and vegetables than Europeans in general. There have been many discussions on parliament and on the news on how to increase fruit and vegetable consumption (because they are after all very good for you) - some say that lowered tariffs and taxes could do the trick (you think????) but little progress has been made.... Salestax alone is 24,5% which is pretty brutal I think except on "neccessities" like milk and other basic foods which carry 14% tax (still to much). And then they wonder why food is so much more expensive here than anywhere else in Europe - they actually had a committee to figure it out - would you believe that the conclusion was that lowering tariffs and taxes could lower the prices ???? We were just stunned! But now I'm wandering a bit off subject... Apples, oranges, pears and bananas are reasonably affordable everything else is a luxury item. Still I'm trying to make an effort to overlook the prices and increase the family's fruit consumption ...

philomel I really hope that we'll be able to explore France one day - it's definately on my to do list! Unfortunately traveling is also VERY expensive ... for some odd reason flying from Iceland and back is more expensive than the other way around ... might have something to do with the fact that it's the only way to go anywhere. But prices have been going down so one day ....

Iceland is really expensive! And whats this about wife swapping or shouldn't i ask??!! Sorry read that in a book about iceland.
Can't you guys use thermal energy to heat greenhouses for fruit production?
First time i flew to iceland was in an old air force plane with deck chairs tied to the floor!
Second time everything was black cause a volcano had just blown up.
Was a lot more civallised this last time.
Mike

Yeah they grow tomatoes cucmbers and bellpeppers in greenhouses - some starwberries too. The icelandic greenhouse grown tomatoes are a lot tastier than the imported ones, but yes, more expensive - still they're worth it.

Wife swapping???????? What book was that in? When was your last visit?
rannveig

I'll pass on the wife swapping as I don't have one to swap, The way the names are given impresses me though, Being someone's daughter or son for life beats having to change your name when you marry in my book. Is it still like that rannveig?

Do hope you make it here :)