Afternoon in Queenspark

Living in little Otautau, our biggest neighbor is Invercargil.  When people say "I'm running to town," what they really mean is they are headed to Invercargil where there are lots bigger stores, a movie theater, and some other things to do.   One of the attractions (at least not in the winter time) is Queens park.  It is a huge park set aside for the locals to enjoy.  It is filled with many different trees, plants, flowers, duck ponds, and even a little zoo.  

One of our favorite spots in the park, just inside the gate is the large rose garden.  It was built up by various rose gardener clubs from around the region and has become a pretty nice display.

The rose garden has more types of roses than you can imagine.  Every other rose bush is a different kind throughout the whole area. 

We took dozens of pictures of the different roses, it's hard to pick just a few there were so many nice colors and different types...

Large red ones.  Sorry floriculturists out there, I did not write down the species from the little plaques.

I didn't really realize, but the roses have many different smells to match their varying colors, shapes and sizes.

Besides the flowers everything was very green.  Little foot paths, paved or beaten, cut through the park in all directions.

One of Rebecca's favorites...

One thing about all these flowers, you had to watch out for the bees at times.  The bees were very happy as you could imagine.

Not sure what these guys are.  They looked like hundreds of butterflies settling on the leaves.

A closer look...

A purple version...

The park has been around for over a hundred years.  Plenty of time for the trees to get huge.  There is actually a full golf course within the park, and this is mostly what the scenery was like for the course.  Very peaceful.

Off the rose garden was a little trail that went through a grove of gnarled trees.  They twisted and turned into a low canopy.  Birds liked to play in the fallen leaves, digging around for lunch.

A bronze statue sits in the middle of one of the path intersections.  Someone had placed a fresh flower in her hands no complement the bronze one she usually holds.  It sure brought her to life.

Down a bit further the ducks were out in force.  They were enjoying a nice pond under a stone walking bridge.  It was a popular place for people to bring their bread scraps and feed them.  Lots of happy ducks and happy kids feeding ducks.  There were LOTS of them.  Watch your step...

The view the other direction from the duck pond...

This little one was watching us suspiciously... He looked like he was hatching a diabolical plan...

Different types of plants and flowers in all directions...

Another colorful one for you....

Rebecca has had a serious shortage of dogs down here.  She worked with dogs at her last job and has been missing our dog Elsie at home, so anytime we see dogs she tries to play with them or at least watch them for a little while.  She saw this pair wandering around a giant tree.  They were to busy to be bothered that day though.

As we walked back to the main area of the park we noticed the pine cones growing right out of the side of the branches from the trees like little tumors. They did not grow at the ends of the branches but down the main trunk.  It was different...

Another shot of all the pine cones running up and down the long limbs...

Almost done with our day we headed to the center of the park where a large gazebo stood.

Lots of nice flower there too.  Would have been a nice place to hang out, but alas no benches..

We headed back down the long path the car AND...

...A wedding in the rose garden!   What a nice place to get married.  Good luck you crazy kids!

When we got back home we had a nice surprise waiting for us.  Our neighbor George had brought us a large bucket of broad beans from his garden.  He is always growing something over there for us.  :)

They grew in fuzzy pods, but the beans themselves were huge.  The bean was about the size of the end of your finger.  They were a lot of work.  You had to peel them, then sort of steam them, then a shell would come off of them, then you were left with the bean to eat.  We peeled the whole bucket and froze a bunch for winter.  We ate them several times.  Not bad.  I think they are mostly gone now.

Next up the many adventures of Monica and Cindy!