In Portland, the conifers are green. And big.
Here, well...
But, that's a nice Eriobotrya delflexa at the bottom of the photo.
In California, the landscape rocks are from Arizona. In Oregon, the landscape rocks are from Oregon.
And it rains in July!
In Oregon, the Agaves are--small. That's weird. They look beautiful, though.
Here, the Agaves are as big as Escalades. 
But we have lots of trouble with conifers...
If it's strong and healthy--we can correct that with skillful pruning!
In Oregon, every time I saw an Agave planted next to a dwarf conifer I would giggle. I'm just jealous of the Hostas.
Oregon has glorious Hostas.
Here, there are not Hostas. We have pretend Hostas.
In Oregon, Eucalyptus are treasured, mannerly exotics of exquisite color and grace that die to the ground in the winter.
Here...Ha ha ha! Treasured! Ha ha ha! Where's my chainsaw?
In Oregon, they have white-frosted Fatsias. We don't. Dammit!
But we have orange trees. So we're even.
In Oregon, the lilies are ten feet tall and the Aloes rot over the winter.
In Southern California, the Aloes are ten feet tall and the lilies rot over the winter.
In Oregon, there are woodpiles in the driveways.
Here, if we want to see a fire, we watch one on TV.
In Oregon, the garden companions are simply adorable.
Looky here! Looky there! All those people came on a big bus to pet me!
They are here, too.
In that, we are the same.
Great place, great plants, but I spent most of my visit trying to get my mind around the idea of people actually buying Eucalyptus trees, which to me is on the order of paying good money for poison ivy.
In Portland's climate, of course, Eucalyptus is a well mannered plant with interesting foliage and beautiful fragrance that dies back in winter cold, not the pernicious weed it is in my neighborhood. It just took time for me to get that...
It's not evil! Really!
But again, great place, great plants, some unknown to me...
...others, very familiar.
There is a display garden as well, useful for seeing how plants grow and perform. And for seeing other things.
One of my compadres bought a beautiful Hypericum, which the bus ate. It was the official Fling Mystery--where did that Hypericum go? It utterly vanished. Therefore, the bus ate it.
I was tempted by a few plants, but most of my favorites there were ones I already owned.
Great visit, though. Then it was back on the bus, and off to the next location.
What's a Fling, anyway? It's eighty or so avid garden bloggers converging on a city all at once to visit lots of gardens, both public and private, in a madcap whirlwind binge of bus ride, garden, bus ride, garden.
Some of it felt like this:
But then again, a lot of it felt like this:
We were a cheerful and happy group.
and
Our first Fling destination was the only non-garden location: Timber Press, in downtown Portland Oregon.
We mobbed the place, ate some good food, and bought a few books.
The garden portion of our tour began with the Lan Su Garden, also in downtown Portland. What was fascinating: Lan Su is very similar in style to the Huntington's version, Liu Fang Yuan.
The tranquility of the place almost made us forget we were in the middle of a city. Almost...
I had the luxury of comparing Portland's version to one I have visited many times. The buildings, bridges, walls, stone are all in a nearly identical style.
The overwhelming difference is one of scale. The Portland version is intimate--on the scale of a private garden--albeit a luxurious one.
The Huntington's version is public-sized: the initial phase was five acres and the ultimate size is 12 acres.
Portland's garden can fit entirely inside the one-and-a-half acre lake of Liu Fang Yuan, with a half-acre to spare.
One feature of both gardens--though due to scale, Portland's was more obvious--was the use of structures to frame views. Everywhere there were frames controlling what the visitor saw.
Visitors were framed:
Frames within frames.
Patterns within frames.
The Huntington wins on size, but Portland's has many more interesting and more unusual plants.
Rubus lineatus:
Portland's of course has more moss.
Several very helpful employees were available to identify plants and explain features of the garden.
It was a great start to the Fling.
The fun had begun.
In Oregon, the Agaves are--small. That's weird. They look beautiful, though. 
In Oregon, they have white-frosted Fatsias. We don't. Dammit!
