Metlifecare Greenwood Park

July 2015

A small but enthusiastic posse of G3ers took a wander around Metlifecare Greenwood Park at the city end of Welcome Bay this morning. We were met by village manager Todd Jenkins who gave us some stats:

·         The village is about to celebrate 30 years and is New Zealand’s oldest independent living retirement village

·         The site was once a sloping block of clay and swamp, which has been planted and developed over the decades

·         There are 240 homes in the complex, with 350 residents. The youngest are 55.

Head gardener David Wilson took us along the manicured pathways. We started with a scented garden, planted especially for visually impaired residents. It is looking a bit scraggly, as David says scented gardens often do, so he’s starting to fill it in with other plants. There’s a buxus-edged formal garden near one of the putting greens, large drifts of poppies, and many large specimen trees – from the Australian baobab to the evergreen gordonia axillaris. David says about 20 percent of residents do their own gardening; the rest of it is done by David and his team of three gardeners. When homes become vacant, they are given a spruce up. Part of that involves ripping out the old garden and planting a garden which suits the new owners’ tastes and mobility. David showed us around a bare courtyard plot, formerly dense with camillas and fiddly rose gardens, which he was about to replant with lower-maintenance options.

The Quail Trail is a grove, planted predominantly by David, over the past 20 years. It starts with large timber steps, supported by a sturdy handrail, and meanders alongside the Kaitemako Stream. It passes through a swampy area planted with lovely willows and poplars, and sidlings and banks planted in sycamores, kowhai, maple and swamp cypresses. David says plants are bought from wholesalers from Palmerston North to Auckland, and he usually spends several hundred dollars each order. There are problems with possums, as evidenced by the apple-laced traps around the grounds, and pukeko stalking through the reeds around the stream.

There’s a massive pad of dirt that’s been built up and created entirely from compost. The pads is now used to collect compost which can be used around the grounds.

Pussy cats leap about in the shadows – flashes of much-loved fur out on adventures whilke their owners play croquet or do aqua aerobics.

At the end of the trail is the gardener’s shed. They don’t have a shade house but a well planted space, dominated by mature trees, does an excellent job of protecting plants yet to be dug in.

This is near where residents’ campervans are parked when not in use. And closeby is an allotment garden where residents can grow vegetables and make their own compost. There was an abundance of rhubarb and broad beans and perfectly-spaced wee strawberries under bird-proof netting.

We wandered back to our cars, passing villagers playing croquet on a perfect lawn on a perfect winter’s morning, and vowed to return on a summer’s day with more of our G3 buddies in tow.

Keri