Sacha writes
As to the den, I couldn't agree more. I remember an early garden of my
childhood where the gaps in the shrubbery were where we escaped to,
certain our parents had no idea we were there. ;-)

We had a wonderful den inside a shrubbery, mostly of box. Inside there
someone had made a small village, with a little brook (about a foot wide
and deep) with an arched bridge over it, houses, a church (all out of
cement) ... for a much earlier generation of children. In those days
(the turn of the - last - century) the box must have been small, to make
little trees, but by the time we got to it, it was a jungle that his us
all and was magic! I have loved the smell of box ever since!
--
Klara, Gatwick basin