Our first stop on Vancouver Island was Butchart Gardens. Mike's Mom had been there many years ago and we thought we should see them.
First stop - the coffee shop for some lunch, a browse in the gift shop, and then our walk through the gardens that were planned and designed by Mrs. Butchart and of course a landscape gardener.
In a word? Beautiful!
Mrs. Butchart's back yard was beyond ugly - a dug out limestone pit with chimneys etc. from her husband's cement factory. What it became was a combination of great imagination, much study and research (in the days before computers made research so easy), a lot of labour, and of course a goodly amount of money.
The tall lombardy poplars in the sunken garden were planted to cover up the cement plant chimneys, which they do very well. I wonder how long it took! Guess I'd better add patience to the above list - essential for gardeners I think.
Mr. Butchart collected rare duck species, and built a special star shaped pond for them. The rose garden has varieties collected on their various travels. There is also a Japanese garden (which our Japanese friend enjoyed). Many of the flowers are annuals or bulbs - dahlias, geraniums, begonias etc. all much larger than ours at home. Imagine the work that takes in the Spring!
Surprisingly, it only took 1-1/2 hours to go through the gardens, which we found later was about average. Beautiful, but at $30 apiece it's maybe a bit overpriced (but since it was crowded, guess it's working for them).
We returned to the stop to catch a bus to continue on our day's 'adventure'.
Great pic of you two, nice backdrop! Sounds expensive but how else do you see these places??
ReplyDeleteLove reading about your travels!!