Garden Walk

My neighbor invited me to run away from responsibility for a few hours and join her for a wander through lovely gardens. I know better than to say no to that.

So we wandered paths and found hidden nooks where we could sit and visit.

The garden is having a tulip festival, so there were many other people at the gardens with us, but that didn’t change the beauty of the flowers. And I managed to keep them out of most of my photographs, thus giving the illusion of a solo walk through beauty.

Following the stream led us to the Monet pond. The waterlilies aren’t blooming yet, but the koi were abundant and beautiful.

Many of the flowers were familiar to me, even if I didn’t know the particular variety. There were tulips everywhere, of course.

Other flowers I’d never seen before, like this plant which was as large as my head, and seems to be related to a cabbage.

I think that the tulips I loved best were these ones, which were like sunlight in flower form, particularly when planted en masse.

As we were wending our way to the exit we were delighted to discover a flight of umbrellas hanging from the trees.

If you’d told me before I saw them that a grouping of umbrellas could make me think thoughts of taking joyful flight, I would have had a hard time picturing it.

I came home with a heart filled with happiness, a camera filled with pictures, and my head filled with hours of visiting with my friend. Sometimes running away is a beautiful thing.