A Sunny Cyprus Six on Saturday

My #SixonSaturday this week comes from the south east coast of Cyprus where we holidayed last week. One of the things I love most about going on holiday is seeing all the unusual plants and flowers in bloom: plants which we would find difficult to grow in the UK without a lot of intervention. To provide extra heat and cosseting for non-native plants is not sustainable for me as a busy gardener and I prefer to grow native or hardy plants and flowers which have a fighting chance of thriving.

That said, I can still marvel at the beauty, and wonder at the form, of plants foreign to our shores. That’s why I also have no intention of finding out the names of many of the plants I meet on holiday – we can all google a plant and sound like an expert! I prefer simply to know I don’t need to know about the best growing conditions or propagation method or feeding regime or hours of sunlight required for a particular plant – it’s like giving my mind a little holiday and I can simply appreciate the beauty for that moment. And then, like the best of all holiday romances, I can come home with some reminder snapshots and special memories!

So here are my #SixonSaturday from sunny Cyprus, starting with the showy Hibiscus plant. It is just a stunner, producing large trumpet-like flowers here in the most vivid red.

The next plant that adorned the rugged coastline I think to some be kind of anemone as the flowers seemed to close together at night. It provided great ground cover along the sandy, rocky shore.

A walk along the coastline provided an opportunity to be amazed at the form of the Palm leaves against the clear, blue sky. It’s often patterns in nature which we fail to notice on an everyday basis which can strike us as truly beautiful!

I was also lucky enough to be in Cyprus when these Palm Trees were in fruit. I believe these to be dates and it was lovely to see something with such a striking architectural form, be also so productive.

These gorgeous yellow flowers adorned many streets and from a distance looked not dissimilar to hydrangeas but on closer inspection, the form the flowers is like a collection of tubular yellow bells – just delightful!

No visit to a warmer climate could fail to draw me to the Bougainvillea and the bright, cerise pink flower was abundant everywhere we looked in Cyprus! If I ever were to own a restaurant, it would be like the one pictured below, enveloped in Bougainvillea!

#SixonSaturday is a Twitter hashtag hosted by The Propagator as gardeners around the world share six things from their garden on a Saturday for information and inspiration. You’ll find lots of links on Twitter on the #SixonSaturday hashtag to other #SixonSaturday blogs for information and inspiration. You can find The Pink Wheelbarrow on Twitter at @PinkWheelbarrow.

Do feel free to me leave a comment on these six as I love to chat about plants! The Pink Wheelbarrow is also on Instagram if you are looking to get a daily image of plant and flower loveliness and I’d love to connect with you there too!