by The Extraordinary Tourist

Created on: February 19, 2009   Last Updated: March 01, 2009

"These are the best grapes I've ever tasted" I exclaimed to my partner of nine years, Kathy.

In our house I do the majority of the gardening. Everything from cutting the lawn to butchering our fruit trees. I have no idea about gardening but if it can be cut, hacked, dug or watered then that's what I know.

"I don't know what came over that grapevine after five years. Why do you suppose it suddenly decided to produce grapes?"

Kathy's not that much into gardening either but compared to me she's a qualified horticulturist - she actually knows the names of some of the plants.

However she didn't know the answer to my question.

The grapevine (or should that be collection of twisted sticks) has been a part of our house's garden ever since we moved in five years ago. Most of that time it has consisted of two vines, along side the garage, barely a foot high with gnarled and dried branches that I don't recall ever grew a single leaf.

We've never really watered it or tried to look after it in any way. Living in the southern parts of Australia its survived through the full force of the afternoon sun during some pretty extreme summers.

This particular pair of grapevines are an inspiration. Despite the odds they've never given up. "You can't hold us back" their contorted old branches scream through the haze of yet another searing summers day.

Last spring I noticed leaves and feelers shooting out from everywhere. I actually had to tie wires across for the vine to climb up. When the vines were four feet high I noticed that it was actually starting to bare fruit. The beginnings of several bunches of grapes were forming.

I don't know what came over these vines. Maybe they finally hit the ground water that's been keeping our nearby orange tree alive and thriving for all the time we've lived here (we rarely water that either).

However once I saw we might actually get a crop of grapes a light bulb went off in my head.

"I should probably water the grapes."

I know, I know, genius right? So I kind of watered them, every now and again and they kept right on growing.

By the middle of the summer the vines were about five feet high and not much wider across. They produced just enough bunches of grapes to share them with relatives and to enjoy for for a while ourselves too.

Everyone commented on how nice the grapes tasted. Particularly mentioning how sweet and juicy they were.

For myself I was just amazed that the grape vines were actually still alive in the first place. Another triumph in the face of adversity. Namely me and my barbaric approach to gardening.

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