Dead easy unless you get massive frosts....
I have a rich tropical garden in Melbourne no frosts here though.
Big abysinnian bananas or real bananas grow really fast and look fantastic. They are brilliant to begin...Almost any palm will do but not the Queen or cocos palm you will regret the day you put them in. I have lots of small and tall phoenix roebellini which are stunning and bangalows. a few other sorts but they are slow to get going. Bamboo clumping type is brilliant or even running kept in a root barrier cannot be beaten. try the big culm sorts in a small grove...do not be put off by the small plant large price tag they grow stupendously fast I got mine from Bamboo oz and they are nearly 2 and very big and juicy.
Fruit trees...well I went mad from Daleys and have 47 varieties...may as well get something from all that green
Cannas fast and spectacular especially the coloured ones Hibiscus from Perrys SA(they also have fruit trees and bananas)coleus, corylines, gingers, brugmansias...anything with fragrance big leaves and colour...they all live with one another happily...there are great books about like "palms won't grow here and other myths'
" and "the new exotic garden " by will giles Also his website (just google on will giles) they have built fabulous gardens where it is under snow for part of the year.
Ah also water gardens papyrus and I even have a big pond of lotus...anything is possible have fun

Thanks spikeandkendra for your suggestions. Am so over my 70's native garden, but have a gorgeous huge Elm tree and Mulberry that link together which create a cosy shady ambience. This should give me something to start with.

Will definately seek out the plants and web sites. Will spend the winter season planning and preparing soil as I would think it too cold to be madly planting during winter? except for fruit trees.

Met a Vietnamese lady gardener recently who is so passionate about her garden that she will plant in the wee hours of the morning if the mood strikes her, as she cannot wait till the morning. Lights up the backyard and off she goes. I wish I could be that passionate or fearless. (Too worried about creepy crawlies)!

Cheers! and Happy Gardening.

Danyala,
Some other things you could try (I have all of them growing outside in Melbourne) are Elephant's ear (Alocasia), Cast Iron Plant (Aspadistra), Staghorns, Treeferns, Clivia, Lamium, Liriope, Plectranthus oerendahlii, Bird's nest fern, Impatiens, Aucuba japonica, Fatsia japonica and Nandina domestica. They are all happy to grow in the shade and are all reasonably easy to look after. They would all blend easily into a tropical setting.
Cheers,
Dee.

Try some clumping bamboo,such as Bambusa textilis "gracilis"
or "Ghost bamboo" Dendrocalamus minor var Amoenus.They will both handle your climate and look very lush.

Hi,

Burkes Backyard magazine has had several stories on the 'tropical look in cold climes' : probably the most striking was a garden in Auckland that had the 'Polynesian look' : very 'tropical' at first glance, but on closer inspection they were all plants like tree ferns which can handle a temperate climate. I'd suggest taking a good walk around your local nursery and 'grouping' a few pots together to see what they will look like - the tropical 'feel' is as much about lush greenery and 'enclosure' as it is about particular species (assuming that your foundation plants are palms and the like).

Good luck,

Artie

I too am in the process of doing exactly the same Bali type garden. I have used a lot of palms in pots, Dracena, Pittosporum, Cordylines and a Ganeesha statue I purchased from Tony Green at the Myponga markets on a Sunday. I am also buying a Bali lantern and perhaps a Bali pergola (price permitting) from a Balinese couple who live at Alberton..Please contact me direct for any other info..we may find it mutually beneficial..BOB bobskey@ozemail.com.au