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Meadowlark Botanical Gardens
We decided to visit Meadowlark Botanical Gardens again today, late in the morning before heading to lunch in Fairfax. While we didn’t find any Baltimore Orioles this time around, we did see many birds and pretty flowers! We also saw our first Purple Martins, a species that we’ve never seen before!
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Lotus Season at Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens
The lotus flowers at Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens have begun to bloom! We made a late morning visit to check them out. Its not peak yet but there are some very beautiful examples already! Peak bloom is currently expected to occur in three weeks.
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National Arboretum and the Fern Valley
After having lunch inside the DC beltway, we decided to head a bit further in to the National Arboretum. We parked at the National Grove of State Trees and ultimately found ourselves walking along the short Fern Valley loop trail. A nice walk with a nice breeze, lots of shade, some flowers, and a few birds.
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Meadowlark Botanical Gardens
Yesterday, there was a significant chance of rain all day. Today was looking worse with thunderstorms in the afternoon. But, things started clearing up before noon and the updated forecast was for overcast skies but little chance of rain. So, we decided to head to Meadowlark Botanical Gardens in Virginia! We visited for the first time last week and noticed a likely oriole nest so wanted to check it out again.
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Rural Howard & Montgomery Counties
I originally wasn’t going to write about our trip today to Western Regional Park in Howard County, Maryland, and the Brighton Dam Azalea Garden in Montgomery County. While nice places to take a walk, we didn’t see too much and the azaleas were already gone. However, we saw our first ever male Baltimore Oriole! So definitely worth writing about!
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Meadowlark Botanical Gardens
This afternoon, we decided to visit the Meadowlark Botanical Gardens in Vienna, VA. It ended up being quite a nice place to visit! We enjoyed walking the paths and encountering a number of birds as well as observing some interesting behavior. It is also apparently quite popular for quinceaños photography as we saw a number of groups going through the park.
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Kauai Sugarloaf Pineapple Harvested
Back in November, 2018, we visited Paul & Jude‘s Hole in the Mountain Farm where they grow Kauai Sugarloaf Pineapple on the Hawaiian island of Kauai. This variety of pineapple is less acidic and less fibrous than regular pineapples and can be eaten in large quantities without feeling unwell. It also tastes better.
We did the tour that they currently offer weekly. It is fantastic and definitely a must-do activity when on Kauai. They go through the farming process and you get to both eat freshly cut pineapple as well as harvest one and bring it home. We decided to try planting our crown. We weren’t sure if we would be successful as pineapple plants can become relatively large and can’t be left outside during the winter in our local climate. It did grow and now, more than three years later, we finally harvested our pineapple!
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National Arboretum
This afternoon, we headed over to the National Arboretum to take a walk around the dogwood and Asian collections on the east side next to the Anacostia River. It is directly across from the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens where we were yesterday afternoon. Generally speaking we don’t know much about plants other than some are quite nice to look at.
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Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens
We decided to head to the Maryland / DC border to try out a Texas BBQ restaurant. 2Fifty Texas Barbecue was legit – just like the real thing down in Texas! Afterwards, we needed walk around a bit so headed to the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens, just a few minutes away on the DC side. Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens is part of the larger Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens, a unit of the National Park Service.
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Southwestern Badlands
We only had a few hours this morning before needing to return to Rapid City to catch our flight. We decided to check out the remote southwestern corner of Badlands National Park. There isn’t really anything developed in this region, just a few roads, farms, and wilderness.
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Here and there but not quite everywhere!