More Naples Botanical Garden

Here are some photos from the beautiful afternoon we spent at the Botanical Gardens on Sunday....I liked the name of this bamboo..it's called "dwarf Buddha Belly bamboo"....

Here are some more beautiful lily pads we saw in the Brazilian Garden...

And some more...

This powder puff blossom must have been extra sweet and having a "bad hair day" for these bees to be so interested...

Can't remember the name of these hot pink blossoms!

We found some literature on the Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park (love these Florida names!) ...I think we are going to check that out tomorrow or we might check out the vendors at the Fort Myers RV show...we saw a brand new 2011 coach pull in at the resort yesterday with a new feature, a slide within a slide! Interesting! It's a Monaco Diplomat coach. We have absolutely no interest in any other coaches now that we have our Phaeton, but as far as vendors go, there are many many things that are interesting to RV owners once you have an RV. One of the things that concerns us is tire pressure--on our car and the RV. If we had a blowout on the car while towing, we would have no idea of that unless some motorist frantically honked and waved at us to communicate something wrong. Having had a tire blowout in the car recently while driving the car itself, makes us worry while towing it down the road. These systems install easily by way of radio frequency tire valve stems. If pressure drops, an alarm at the driver's dashboard in the RV lets you know immediately there's a problem. Hm-m-m-m, RV show or state park preserve--I vote for the preserve! We'll check out those tire monitoring systems at a later date, I'm sure.

The gater stories will have to wait till tomorrow..I'm still trying to find out how much truth there is to some information we were given at a local park about them...see you later, alligator!

Naples Botanical Gardens

If you've never seen the gardens at Naples Botanical Garden, you have to go...incredible plantings and international gardens. The gardens are divided into sections--a children's garden, a butterfly house, a Brazilian garden, a Caribbean garden, a filter marsh representation of the Everglades, a water garden, an Asian garden, a Florida "idea" garden, an enabling garden that demonstrates strategies to garden even if you have physical challenges. There is a wetlands preserve and uplands preserve, a birding platform and an area where concerts are held in front of the water garden. There are several walking trails about a half mile long and one mile trail that take you out further around the park for your enjoyment. There are many park benches, little tiki huts, and shelters of different architectural designs to sit under and enjoy the day as well, if you don't want to be in the sun....the plants and trees are labeled clearly so you can learn about the different plant species all around the world...they serve food and drinks here as well.

Part of the Brazilian garden

Yesterday we went to see a jazz concert. Normal entree fee into the botanical gardens is 9.95, today it was 12.95, well worth the cost to walk around and hear the concert from just about anywhere in the garden, or lay in one of several hammocks placed in and around the Caribbean garden, and just enjoy the beautiful music. There was a talented quartet playing with an outstanding vocalist, Rebecca Richardson. She has recorded several jazz CDs and did a terrific job of entertaining us. Doesn't it look like she enjoys what she does? And she was beautiful with a beautiful voice, too! She sounded a lot like Diana Krall.

Rebecca Richardson

We spent a long time after the concert today just enjoying the surroundings...I had never seen bananas growing on trees or pineapples growing in a field, so that was a treat. I loved the Brazilian garden the best...cool mosaic or tile artwork in the background with a waterfall, and beautiful tropical waterlilies....

Here are some water lily pads...the coloring of the lily pads was amazing! I thought the pads themselves were as beautiful as the flowering part. I thought this was cool the way the clouds and tree branches were being reflected into the water...

And here is a flowering bush/tree called the powder puff...there were pink ones and red ones, and as soft as a baby's bottom if you brushed your face against it....Watch out for the bees, though, they LOVE this plant!

The caption for this photo...
"I know there's nectar in here somewhere!"

 We'll save some more photos for tomorrow....it's a rainy day and we'll be spending it at home.....see you then!