Back home! I never left this time!
So yesterday night we would have arrived home in Amesbury, Wiltshire, avoiding the A303 and the queues past Stonehenge, 5 miles farther on.
Sadly, there was no haul of plants to unpack. The dustbin men woke me forcing me to get up and add the empty bottles of Westmalle to the glass only container. It’s still hay-fever season for me – this time due to the orchid pollen, At least I did not suffer any sneezing attacks during the presentations!
Normally, part of the ELK experience is that I would have finalized the upcoming trips to cactus land – checked that my fellow travelers were ready. Check how many pounds we need to change to dollars, pesos or whatever else we need this year. Nothing! Just as well as the currency exchange rates are not good and quite variable. Last year I had already started planning for the next trip, to Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands, bought the books and guides and read up the essentials – where do the cacti grow? The plans will still be good when travel once again be possible.
So it remains for me to thank all the speakers for their fine talks, Ronald Fontyene and Ian Woolnough on the Friday, Rikus van Veldhuisen, Finn Larsen, and Wiebe Bosma on Saturday and Alain Buffel and Jonathan Clark on the Sunday. Brilliant photography, wonderful landscapes and for showing us a huge range of varied plants, some I’ll probably never see in nature – clearly I started too late in life!
I looked through my bank statements and see that there is a lot more money in then normally on this date! Yet I would have gladly seen the usual post-ELK nearly-broke status and look back on the real-life experience!
Finally a great thank you to all those who attended – without you it would have been a very empty and boring on these pages.
If you click on the ‘Follow…’ button at the bottom right of this screen, you’ll get a message of my future webinars, mostly on Sunday night. If you’re free, I’ll be happy to see you there.
Hope to see you next year at Blankenberge for ‘the real thing’!
Stay Safe!
Cheers
Paul
The Cactus Trip Diaries 
Comments on: "Monday 14 September 2020 SWiS 2020 – the morning after" (1)
Next year should be the back to normal edition. Missed you all. Again thank you PK for giving us the feeling to be near to each other. Loads of Belgian beer in my cellar waiting to be shared with overseas friends.