How to pleasently change your life with a rose group on Facebook

Thanks to a rose group :Il giardino e le rose, ( Gio aspis masullo pictured in  the top) i managed to meet fantastic people and get to know of fantastic events .
 For example last week i took a train to Veneto region .....
Last did I know I would  turn into a plant frolicking . Well I am totally lying, just the day before I went to see a talk by nurseryman Luigi Priola, in order to fetch some plants. i order a relative to an euphorbia i love to bits. Euphorbia Mellifera which i used to weed when working as a gardener in Kennington . The name says it all: Devil' s honey, a scented shrub like euphorbia. some selinums, berberis, unusual grasses. all the  horticultural arty-farty stuff.

                                                    Miriam from la Campanella nursery while planting the roses
Then being aware of being totally broke, i nonetheless ventured toward veneto. being dyspraxic, i lost the train and called my poor friend saying there will be some changes in the schedules. I improvidìsed to meet long lasting friends with whom I have collaborated: Vivaio La campanella old rose nursery and raziel bulbs. I entered in the secret chambers of treasures. Where millions of bare rooted where stocked after being harvested from the field where they have been grafted in the rootstock( a wild rose where the variety is grated) and now they were potting these roses. At Raziel i disturbed them, while they were busy in a similar manner potting millions and millions of bulbs.
        The day  day after  I asked my poor sancho to follow me in my don quijotisms and to go near Verona, to see a marvellous talk by Maurizio Usai and Matteo la Civita about their marvellous landscape designs.These two guys are known internationally.The talk, was sublime, amazing pictures, with a lot of verve between the two landscape architets. ( below bare rooted roses )

Before this event we managed to see a friend,  another landscape designer Luca Fadini, who showed us the gigantic valleverde garden centre, where he is the resident  garden architect. Was mesmerised by the big greenhouses, where they produce pelarginiums, poinsettias, cyclamens, with 70 employees, and the quality of the plant was superb, and the atmosphere was fairy tale like...
   Maurizio Usai and Elena Longo and fantastic organiser Gloriana Chiodi
The third  day,  we needed one hour to get there and Maurizio Usai and Elena Longo were helding a rose pruning workshop. Maurizio delighted us, with several insights of which I was totally unaware. The duo was absolutely stunning. Followed by  a delicious lunch ,  organised by Gloriana Chiodi (the mastermind behind all these events). There were many friends from the  fantastic facebook rose group: Il giardino e le rose. Giò Masullo is the leader and he was as usual so full of verve and adorable, then a stunning curly haired lady Monica, a lovable  and sensual Federica and a the heartbraker stud  Francesco. The gang woke up at 3 o clock to attend to the workshop. The practical side was held at Gloriana s park. Elena s way of pruning was totally opposite to Maurizio, but each was perfect to a different class of roses. Maurizio is more specialised in subtropical roses, the chinensis group, which abhor hard pruning (since the lymph is stored in the upper part of the shrub being in almost perennial activity) , while the european group due it s dormancy period, stores the lymph in the roots while not growing. We had some refreshments at Gloriana s beautiful house and it was lovely
  The last day there was a tour in the oldest botanical garden: the padova s garden. There was a reunion of the plant lovers , Adipa, marshalled by Patrizia Ianne( an international  fuchsia specialist) dispensing accademic knowledge about plants in such a witty and energetic manner it was pure bliss. Thanks to fantastic Giò I managed to visit magnuficent garden bt Muchele Calore. Michele is famous for its refined colour schemes of perennials mixed shrubs and grasses. Grasses where at their vernal garment, in the varous fawn, buff and beige hues. Of the most sophisticated impressions it was truly amazing.
I learnt a great deal from Usai, saw so many things i needed a whole week to recover from such beauties and the friendly atmosphere. Thank you

Last but absolutely not the least  is the picture of the great landscape designer Matteo La Civita famous for it s peonies and his designs. He lives in London