Wherever we are on holiday in warm climates we look at all the flowers and wonder if they will survive in this climate, are there really flowering perennials which will survive -20^oC and +40^oC!

Not only do we want colour in our garden but we also need to find somewhere which sells good quality plants which will have a chance of surviving.

With this agenda, we set off one day last year to scour the land for a garden center. We headed South, a short 100km towards Strumica, the positive part of 100km is that the road is relatively new, in good condition and there is very little traffic on the road. Traffic jams are as common as aliens in this part of the world. Unless you count this as a traffic jam of course.

Strumica is located near the border with Greece and Bulgaria in the south-eastern part of North Macedonia with a population of around 55,000 inhabitants.

On the way to Strumica we noticed along the roadside a couple of garden centers but decided to keep going to the city and to visit these on the way home.

Once in Strumica we found it was deserted. There were bars and cafe’s which were relatively full of young people eating and drinking but mainly enjoying the air conditioning which was more than welcome as the temperature outside had reached approximately 38^oC by this point. We had a walk around but found nothing remarkable to note and with no larger garden center in sight we headed back to the roadside garden centers.

Once on the way we stopped to look at the plants, we had already decided that perhaps Oleanders would be a good choice as they are versatile, can withstand high and low temperatures of +40 ^oC and low temperatures down to minus 15 degrees Celsius. The risk with Oleanders are that they are very poisonous for children and pets so worth a precautionary note that children do not go and pick flowers from the bushes and all pruning should be done with gloves on. Apparently the Oleander contains cardiac glycosides, which can cause gastro-intestinal and cardiac problems after ingestion.

We arrived at he garden center and finding that they did indeed sell Oleanders we chose some pink and red ones and proceeded to load them into the car. This said quickly sounds pretty standard but was in fact pretty heavy going as they were not lightweight, had to be carried from their standing place to the car around 200 meters over a muddy, gravely path added to the fact that the thermostat was still aiming for 40^oC!

Having finally succeeded in loading 10 of these big pots into the car we went to pay for them.

Oeps, no card, only cash. Which we didn’t have.

Where was the nearest ATM? 20km along the road.

Did we really have to unload everything again, the sweat was pouring off us, we had drank about 2 liters of water and really wanted to get back into the air-conditioned car.

Fortunately for us the lady at the garden center decided that we looked reasonably honest, wrote down our numberplate of the car, took our address and said we could go and get the money from the ATM and come back and pay. Which we gratefully did.

And how are the Oleanders doing now? Take a look at How does your garden grow. for an update!