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May 19th, 2007
Lots
to add to the site, and I suppose this is the season it gets difficult
to find time to edit the site, and still spend as much time as I'd like
in the garden. I'll drop in a recent photos of the garden below, but first a quick rant:
Last week, I went on a road trip with my girls to Port Alberni. I'll
insert here a "thank you" to my in-laws for their hospitality out on
the island. While we were there, we took a day to see the sights in
Tofino. Just outside of town, there was a tourist attraction I just
couldn't pass up: the Tofino Botanical Gardens.
Now, I'll admit it publicly: I'M A SUCKER. Basically, you could put up
a road sign at a sewage treatment plant, and as long as you billed it
as a Botinical Garden, I'd pay the admission. I made a similar error is
a town called "Balzac" (of all things) once, so this isn't an isolated
incident.
So I don't want to give you the wrong impression: the Tofino Botanical
Gardens isn't a complete waste of time. If you're looking for a walk in
the woods, or some funky folk-art structures, it might be worth the
price of admission, and the time it takes to walk through it. And, I
have to admit, it was quite child friendly, so the girls were happy to
take the detour. It just isn't what I'd call a botanical garden.
I kept waiting for the nature trails to open upon a clearing where I'd
find something botanically interesting. As it was, we did find a cool
"hippie van" that the girls enjoyed playing in, and the walk through
the forest ecosystem of Clayoquot sound was quite nice, but the gardens
themselves were a bit underwhelming. Oh well... maybe they'll add more
to it over time, or maybe their definition of Botanical Garden is
simply a lot different than mine.
No matter. I suspect that this minor disappointment won't teach me any
lesson at all - I'll still stop the car for any garden related
attraction, and accept a quick "I told you so" if the stop turns out to
be a bust. It's just in my nature.
Speaking
of nature, here's what one corner of my garden was dong while I was
away. The western bleeding hearts (Dicentra Exima) bloom with yellow
glacier lily (Erythronium Gradiflorum).
Check back in the next week or so to the "My Garden" section of the
site, and I'll post some more plant pictures, and maybe a couple of
shots of the greenhouse we just assembled.
Oh... and click here for old news and rants.
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