Welcome to Greenville!! You are in for a treat. First let me tell you that you likely will not feel the impact of the drought as Greenville has one of the best water conservation systems on the East coast. We do try to conserve water but we have a gracious supply fed by 2 mountain lakes. The downtown Greenville area has been revitalized and now is full of Bistros and great shops. We have a waterfall right in the middle of our once rustic downtown and its a fantastic place to spend the day. Growing seasons are long here and sometimes plants that are close to the house don't even lose all their leaves. We dont have much snow....maybe one good one a year. Keep in mind a 'good one' here means that the snow actually sticks on bushes and grass and school gets called off. lol Our winters here might not give the proper chilling for things like lilacs and currants but since I dont grow these its hard for me to say for sure. We are zone 7a and typically expect a last frost date of April 15 (tax day) but most gardeners here push that. It common for me to have everything in by April 1 with crossed fingers! This is a great place to live....people are so friendly. You have a choice of many nurseries and gardens to visit. You are situated between 2 of the best rose nurseries in the country (Roses Unlimited and Ashdowns). You will be hot during the summers as I find that northern states get night time cooling. We dont get a much of a temp drop in the evenings here. You will acclimate and as a gardener will grow to appreciate this heat and the longer season it brings. I had roses blooming in October!! Feel free to email me with any questions you have....you are in for a real treat.....welcome to SC!! Ronda Here is a link that might be useful: Photos of Upstate SC

Ooohhh, I love all these new rock pics! That glass rock is stunning! And Xuan, your dry garden is really pretty. : ) "Did anyone else notice that there appears to actually be a bear in the second photo of Diane's friend's waterfall? I don't know it that is what it is but it isn't there in the first pic of the same spot. Oh, and by the way, That's a lot of da** rocks! Awesome waterfall". Haha! I forgot about that "bear". It's not real. It's a metal form of a bear. It does look real in the pic, though. If you look at the other pic you can see that it's taken at a slightly different angle, just enough to hide the bear. But these are the San Gabriel Mtns. and we do have bears so I'm sure my friend will be having real fur friends visit this winter. : ) DH and I are digging a pond, which seems to be growing in size everyday (is that a guy thing?), as is the rock pile. We've even found wood attached to some of the rock. Very cool.

Yeah, I sure miss the old days when you could do all the work on your car yourself. I had a 240Z as a college student and changed the transmission with my boyfriend. I always did as much work as I could on my car (mom once said to a friend, "My little girl has turned into a boy." ;-)) They make it so difficult to do it yourself anymore. Husband threw a fit the first time he tried to check the oil in an ex car we had, there was no way to check it, only way was the idiot light, it was sealed. Husband being a race car driver we have a full set of metric and imperial, so we're set for anything. Pam

Carolina Reaper Cuda911March 25, 2013 Hey, new to this site, but far from new to growing. Habajalokia or whatever his name is killed the last Carolina Reaper thread, so resurrecting it. HOUZZ "lifted" the 150 post limit so I'm resurrecting the original.