Gardens at the HCP!

Good morning! I am up bright and early because we are off on another adventure...

 Can you guess what it might involve???

It's the Gardens at the Horticulture Centre of the Pacific! I wanted to go to Butchart Gardens but... mid-March is not a great time and it's expensive... and this was cheap soo... here we are!

These gnomes offered to give me a tour but I figured we could manage on our own.

Let's see what we can find...

Some nice hyacinths are out... pretty.

Here's the herb garden - Jerry and Ben would love this.

 Oooohhh.... heather!!!

Lots of different types of heather. All in full bloom!

So much fun...

 And a great place to play hide and seek too. Wait... do you think there might be spiders in here...

 They have a Japanese garden too...

No koi in the pond though... maybe they're still hibernating?

I imagine this place is gorgeous in the summer.

Bonzai trees!!! Just my size!

Don't ya think? Perfect trees for a little bear.

 I could sit under one and contemplate honey all day.

 I wonder if this is the dinner bell??

There are lots of rhododendron bushes here... but not a lot in bloom.

Oh... wait.... here's one!

Hah! I like this sign!

They even have some faux ruins... do you see me?

I have really good butt balance I do...

How about now? Do you see me??

Right there... in the middle!

 This garden also has a graft of the Golden Spruce from the Charlottes... err... from Haida Gwaii... the former Queen Charlotte Islands.

It's a pretty sad little graft, I have to say...

But you can see the golden needles...

A few years back, some nutty forestry worker cut down the Golden Spruce in Haida Gwaii... he was supposed to go to trial but mysteriously vanished while kayaking from Prince Rupert to Massett for his trial.... beary mysterious... There's a book about it... "The Golden Spruce: A Story about Myth, Madness and Greed"...

Phew... what a day... nice to just sit by the ocean and relax before dinner...

Which was meat pie... mmmm...

And a truffle sampler!! Oh yummmmmmm....

And a beer sampler!