Walking Tour du Ludington

 As promised, I went to the Mason County Garden Club fall plant sale. I bought several plants that I'll show you over time.

Then, I walked a big loop mostly around the north side of the city. I wanted to get in more miles today without driving farther away, and I managed 5.3 of them. Here's some of what I saw. I was particularly interested in gardens that still look good in September.

This is a formal setting, completely hidden by a hedge when walking one direction, but from the other way it's like a secret nook. I like it, even though it's completely green. Everything just works well.

These dark hydrangeas are stunning. They are set off nicely by the hosta, although I see that the deer have been keeping some of those trimmed. (I'm told the deer in town are out of control.)

This kind, panicled hydrangea (the flower clusters are conical) have become quite popular, and the blooms seem to last well.

The beach was deserted today. It was windy and chilly. The red light- for no swimming- was lit.

The marina isn't deserted, but it's certainly not full.

I thought this was a really nice-looking garden with various textures and colors- both of flowers and foliage. I used to have some of that Red Baron grass, but mine was never happy. I would think the ferns in the back would prefer more shade, but they seem OK, except they are drying out now- not surprising for September. Most allium (the purple in the front) bloom in the spring, but this is nice. It may be 'Ozawa,' a fall bloomer. The bushes with pink in the middle are probably a spirea. I'm surprised they still have flowers, but I'm sure there are lots of varieties.

Here's a more typical commercial planting of annuals in front of the bank. Canna lily, impatiens, dusty miller, marigolds, and petunias. Nothing "interesting," but it's been kept nicely, and it still looks great.

This is the 37th year of the Ludington Petunia Parade. 30,000 petunias are planted each year along most of Ludington Ave, and along the Marina. Soon the plants will be pulled to keep the soil in good shape for the next year. There is some specific biological reason for this that was printed in the paper after a lot of complaints about the locals not getting to enjoy them very long after the tourists leave, but I don't remember what it is. Right now, they are still looking lovely. This is at the water treatment plant, and it just shows the colors nicely with a sign. Most are down at curb level.

But. It is September. Hints of what's to come.

I gave myself a break today and mostly goofed off after I got home. Shower, eat, etc. Played with garden records, and didn't do much that was required. A day off (on purpose) is good once in a while.

Miles hiked in 2024: 406.4

See Mini Tour du Ludington

Sonnenberg House and Gardens

 The Sonnenberg Mansion in Canandaigua is a 40-room house built in the late 1800s in the Queen Anne style. This house is a little older and smaller than the Stan Hywet mansion we visited in 2016. Sonnenberg means "sunny hill." It was not the name of the owner. This was the summer home of Frederick Thompson, a New York City banker. His wife Mary was the governor's daughter.

The Conservatory is the oldest working wooden greenhouse in the northeast, and it is the oldest in the United States that has not been modified. It's considered one of the finest privately owned greenhouses. The estate is now operated as a non-profit arm of the NY Parks and Recreation Department, but the greenhouses were originally private.

The estate was opened to the public in 1973, but a lot of repairs and restoration have been ongoing since that time. A number of the gardens could have used a lot of attention, but it was still worth the visit. This is the formal Italian Garden. The view was the best from an upstairs porch of the house because you could see the fleur-de-lis design of the plantings.

The Moonlight Garden featured all white flowers. Many were supposed to be fragrant. This is Casa Blanca lily.

The Old Fashioned Garden used a popular 17th Century design. There were boxwood hedges with perennial beds inside and a long pergola down the middle.

I think they are saving money on the plants and putting the fund toward restoration. Most of the plants were things you could commonly buy at a good greenhouse. I guess that's OK for now. There were a couple I did not know. This is Macedonian Scabious, Knautia macedonia. Japanese anemone was in bud, but none were open. I don't think I've seen that before either.

My favorite garden was the Rock Garden, although there is still a lot of repair work to do. First of all, this is hugely different from my rock garden. Tons of rock were hauled in to make a miniature canyon and streams. They are currently raising money to restore the water circulation system so the 500 feet of streams and pools will function. And it's big- at least an acre. This is part of the constructed "canyon." You could walk a gentle incline through the middle or go up the stairs to the right.

The central path went under this arch, then climbed and curved around to cross the top of the arch as a bridge.

At the top, there was one more level of an observation deck. It was shaded by a plant that was actually planted for the original estate. This is a climbing hydrangea, Hydrangea anomala, native to Asia. It's over 85 years old. The bark peels like sycamore. This was also new to me.

I guess if you want more pictures from Sonnenberg you'll have to hope I have a "slow news day" in the near future. This is about enough for now.

But I'll show you one orchid from the conservatory. They had a tropical room, a desert room, and orchid room, and a couple more. There was a recording playing with info, but I didn't catch all that it said. Anyway, this is Brassia arachnoidea, one of the spider orchids.

When I say "we" went to the garden... Marie and I, Marie's brothers and their wives, Melanie, and Ruth and Dan all went. It was quite a production. But I spent a fair amount of the day on my own so I could take all the pictures I wanted and read the signs.

The house was open too. I got a few pictures of the interior.

Tonight, we are at Larry and Pam's house. Working our way east.

See Stan Hywet

Last Night on the Coast

 It's my last night here. Sad. But my motto is to leave before people get tired of me. I'll just give you a sampler of some more of my Gulf Coast experiences.

Yesterday we went out to eat in Biloxi. The maritime scenes and decor are so familiar to me. This is the view from the restaurant and the end of Deer Island.

However, you probably won't see a Marlin in Michigan.

Or crab art made from bottlecaps.

Homes near the water that have been rebuilt after Katrina have to have their living space high above the ground level. Some are more finished than this one, but this does a good job of showing what I mean. The lower level is storage or garage space.

Recovery is not complete, but things are pretty well back to normal. Here's a recreational paraglider over the Gulf.

This is a grove of Crepe Myrtle trees- very common ornamental tree in the South, but I liked the light and shade.

This evening, Margaret made pizzelles which are Italian waffle cookies. Her neighbor came over and we talked about the trail.

I've probably doubled my knowledge of the South in three days. That's a measure of how little I knew, not so much about how much I've learned.

And primarily, I've renewed my friendship here. Such good times.

See Under the Dome

Under the Dome

 The First United Methodist Church in Gulfport is Dale and Margaret's church. The present building was built in 1913 after a previous one burned.

The most amazing feature of the building is a 32-foot-diameter stained glass dome. This was made somewhere in Europe (exact records have been lost), but came to this location when the oil man from Texas who had ordered it was unable to complete the purchase when he went bust. The pieces were already in New Orleans, and the company let the church buy it for the outstanding balance of $1500. This was a big enough sum in 1913 that the church had to think about it. Of course its current value is just a "bit" more than that!

The church had planned a plaster dome and designed and built the rest of the church. It was considered almost miraculous that this suddenly available piece of art was the exact size to fit the existing hole.

It shows angels delivering the message of Peace and Good Will to Humankind.

Here is the sanctuary, and you can see the dome in the ceiling.

Other stained glass windows tell Bible stories. Jesus knocking at the door (of your heart).

Jesus the Good Shepherd.

And a rather unusual one- Jesus with Mary and Martha. Notice there is a dog curled at his feet. I don't think I've ever seen this story rendered in stained glass before.

These are exceptionally high quality glass images.

There are also 22 needlepoint kneeling cushions, made by 25 women in 1989. Each shows two angels holding some symbol of the church or the Gulf Coast. The angels tie in with the theme of the angels in the dome. This cushion shows the angels with a shell.

As I think is typical of Methodist churches, they have a number of service projects. One is "Home Under the Dome," designed to help enrich the lives of adults with memory loss through fellowship and engaging activities while also providing support for caregivers.

BONUS SECTION: Finding myself

We went out to lunch, and on the way passed a souvenir store called Sharkheads. What fun!

This was at the other end. The last "shark store" I found is linked below.

We saw all this on the way home from eating out. Then I went for a walk and found this. I don't think I've ever seen a Joan Street before.

We went out to lunch and saw several other interesting things, but this is enough for today. I'll share tomorrow.

Walking city streets- 6.2 miles

See Coastal See Shark's Ice Cream

Kaleva Day

  I'm calling this post Kaleva Day, even though I was there for an event known as Kaleva Days. That's because my pictures mostly aren't about the event, but are an ecclectic assortment of things around town. I participated in the vendor event and did pretty well. Another part of the event was a classic car show. There were lots more cars, this is just a few.

One man was walking around with a white German Shepherd, which reminded me of Ester's dog, Jade. This one's name was Powder.

I wanted to swing by the Bottle House. I thought sure I'd blogged about that before, but I guess not. This was completed in 1940 and was made out of 60,000 pop bottles. The man who owned the bottling plant built it, but he died before his family could move in. His name was John Makinen.

This totem pole is for my writer friend Diana whose muse is a duck named Drake. The totem symbols come from the Kalevala, an epic Finn tale and the source of the town's name. In the Kalevala legend "the Duck is the Messenger that helped Vainamoinen discover his true powers."

There is also a museum in the old rail station. I'll just have to go back! The Manistee and North Eastern RR ran from Manistee to Traverse City, and was one of the many logging boom lines. Link below to other posts that mention it.

I'll just end with a nice planter. It was a good day and there is no other news.

See Local Finnish Heritage See Manistee and North Eastern RR

Flowers, Houses, Ice Cream

  What do those three things have in common? Today was not the day I had planned AT ALL, but it's all good.

At 12:30 in the night a huge flash of lightning woke me up. Uh-oh! The paint on the trailer was probably dry enough to not be harmed, but all the hardware and gaskets were off the door- big hole instead of the latch. So out I go in my pj's and sandals to put the door back together.

We must have gotten a good rain because everything was totally dripping wet this morning. No getting out there early and putting on the next coat of paint!

Cathy said, "Why don't we walk around Pentwater this afternoon and look at gardens?" I remembered the walking tour Ellen and I had done a number of years ago (see link below), but the guide was Ellen's, not mine. Called the C of C and they have an updated booklet.

At eleven, I went to check the trailer, thinking I might at least get the light sanding between coats done. Getting wet didn't seem to hurt yesterday's paint job, but the yellow seemed just a little softer than would be good to sand. So... no trailer work today! Off we went to Pentwater.

We enjoyed all the beautiful plantings in Pentwater. People seem to go out of their way to create lovely gardens in that town.

We walked to 48 of the 49 locations on the tour. The one we skipped was a church we both knew, so we read about it, but didn't feel the need to walk the extra blocks. I'll try to show you different houses from the ones I featured the last time.

This house is huge. Federal style built around 1870 as a resort hotel. The guide says the porch was added later. It looks to me as if the original was the large square, and perhaps the attachment at the back of that was the summer kitchen. Or perhaps it was added later because the section farthest away is a carriage house/garage. But we couldn't tell if that was an original building or something newer that was made to fit the style. There is also a big enclosed sun room on the side you can't see in the picture. Impressive house.

This one is called Pentwater Cottage style, also built around 1870. I'm not sure what constitutes that particular style, but I've always thought it is a very attractive house. In the spring the yard is full of blue glory-of-the-snow flowers.

Need more flowers? OK.

This one is labeled Early Victorian. I'm an architecture semi-novice, but I would be interested in knowing how it got that designation. This does not say "Victorian" to me. However, it has an interesting history. It was owned by the daughter of Charles Mears (one of the early lumbermen of Pentwater), who wrote a history of her father (for whom the State Park in Pentwater is named). She also donated the land for the park.

Yup, it was hot, although always cooler near the lakes. We broke up the walk with a stop for ice cream!

And I'll end the house tour with a Folk Victorian house. This was a new label for me. But I looked it up, and it's basically the poor man's Victorian. It was popular from 1880-1910 when the Craftsman look became all the rage. People built simple practical houses and spruced them up with some Victorian trimmings, often mass-produced, as mills became mechanized and railroads could deliver lumber and trims across the country.

One more flower picture. This just says "summer at the lake" to me.

We walked something between 3.5 and 4 miles. We were more interested in the houses and gardens than our mileage. But we were walking (except for the ice cream break) for 3 hours.

In other news: we contemplated a bicycle ride. So I spent some time getting my bike out and checking it, but it needs a new tube which is now purchased. But that meant I had to fire up the air compressor, so I also topped off my car tires and the trailer tires. Since I couldn't sand the trailer, I did do a little volunteer stuff. After the hike I went to buy some groceries and the tube. So... nothing went as I thought the day would go, but it was great. And just after I got home the skies let loose with a real downpour! Supposed to rain for two days, so I won't be painting any time real soon.

Walking around Pentwater Michigan, maybe 3.5 miles

See February Walking Tour