Stripy Rainbow Tulips at Holland's flower garden, the Keukenof

At an early age, I must have decided that flowers
could be stripy rainbow colors.
Orbiting above the flower and the earth,
I think it might be John Glenn,
also in rainbow color.
Our TVs were black and white
but our imagination was in color.

Keukenof is world famous for its spring flowering bulb displays. Their English landscape style garden near Amsterdam is huge. It takes a couple of hours to see the gardens.

In my family, flowers are not necessarily everyone's favorite thing to look at in large quantities, but luckily it was Mother's Day when we visited. And so I was able to cash in on that happy circumstance. I am so glad we went. It was the last weekend they were open to the public and many of the beds had already finished up. There was still an amazing display of flowers.

Branch Studies

Oak tree branch and rocks and hills

Whenever I hike in our local parks, I see the scenes that Eyvind Earle painted. (No, silly, not Sleeping Beauty's castle)

His landscape pictures capture the look and feel of the coastal hills of California - coastlines, green or golden rolling oak hills, long shadows of cattle or trees. Many of his pictures have a tree branch in the foreground. I have wondered about those tree branches. 

Thirty-Six Views of Mission Peak

Many of us Fremont-ers treat Mission Peak as our Mt. Fuji.
Wherever we go we have our own "Where's Waldo?".
This view is from Sabercat Creek.

I really love the  Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji. Each picture has Mt. Fuji in it somewhere, either prominently or somewhat hidden. When you look at each picture, it's like looking for a friend in a crowd or .... a "Where's Waldo?" game!

Farkleberry on the 36th Parallel

There we were on the 36th parallel in the Sarah P. Duke Gardens, in Durham, North Carolina, and I couldn't help but laugh at this plant sign, identifying the "FARKLEBERRY".

For many of us baby boomers, the word "Farkle" conjures up some very funny television.

During our teen era 1968-1973, we were well aware of the battles between television censors and television writers. The Laugh-In show was full of words that sounded bad but were not: "Look that up in your Funk and Wagnalls", "Want a Walnetto?", and "Ring my Chimes!".

Technology Expanding the Park Experience

Go ahead and point your QR reader
at this QR code and you will see one of the stations,
The Jose de Jesus Vallejo Adobe,
on the California Nursery Historic Park tour.

I go to lots of parks. I love parks.
I also love computers and the internet and smart phones.

When they all combine, I am super happy.

More and more often, I am seeing QR codes and other technology in the parks. Here are some of my favorites uses of technology in our parks and beyond.

Tomato Sepal Sprites

At this time of the year, Tomato Season, I am always amused by the tops of the fresh garden tomatoes. Also known as the sepals of the tomato flower and fruit, the tops are very animated looking, almost like little happy people.