Marie Selby Gardens

Tuesday October 25
Laura is still with us until late tomorrow afternoon, so after breakfast the three of us drove to the Marie Selby Gardens in Sarasota. It’s a beautiful place at any time, but they also have their Orchid Show on currently. The Downtown Sarasota Campus on Sarasota Bay is dedicated to the display and study of epiphytic orchids, bromeliads, gesneriads and ferns, and other tropical plants. The Orchid Show 2022: Capturing the Perfect Shot celebrates the beauty and diversity of orchids by featuring unique horticultural displays and stunning scientific photographs of their rare orchid collection, created by a group of skilled photographers deeply connected to Selby Gardens’ mission. Having seen the orchids, we went outside and enjoyed the rest of the gardens, including the lovely view over the bay and the magnificent Morton Bay fig tree, with its huge sprawling buttress roots, top centre photo of my collage. Before returning to the island, Laura wanted to go somewhere to have some tacos for lunch, since they don’t have any good places round her area in Wisconsin. We spent the afternoon on the beach - the weather was gorgeous, and so was the sea, fairly calm and relatively warm. We were treated to the sight of many birds on the beach, mainly Royal terns but also a few Sandwich terns, Willets and American oystercatchers, which I hadn’t seen previous to this trip, so I was thrilled to get some pictures of them. (See extra)
Step count: 9,202