Naples Botanical Gardens, Naples Florida

 For me, heaven can simply be found walking around a garden.  If you like gardens and this is your thing then don't miss Naples Botanical Gardens in Naples Florida.  Thank goodness my sister was visiting with us in Naples and we ventured out and took in the Botanical Gardens.  Darren hates this sort of thing and it was way more fun learning more about plants with a willing accomplice in my sister!!

The water garden was straight out of a Monet painting to the left.

We went early to try and beat the heat of Florida.  We lucked out and took in the free 45-minute tour at 10 am that morning.  The tour guide had a couple of Biology degrees and was quite informative and her passion was plant propagation.  Who knew that no-see-ums fertilize the Cacao pods?  I didn't.  Apparently in Mexico, the Cocao plants are not flourishing because the tourist zones are always spraying for bugs.  This is disrupting chocolate production which is bad but I am horribly allergic to no-see-um bites which are also bad.  This is a quandary.  I love chocolate!  But numerous bites can affect a good trip.  Hmmmmm.

After we toured the gardens we did the 1-mile hike around the lake to get some exercise and that was a nice little walk as well.

Anyways you are about to be bombarded by numerous photos because next to Bouchard Gardens in Victoria this may be one of my favourite Botanical Gardens!!

We learned that as Lily Pad flowers mature they turn from white to pink and mauve.  There is a whole story about this.  I would have to go back and listen to the guide again to learn all of the knowledge that she imparted to us.

Pink Pineapple anyone?

This vine was super pretty and flourishing.

I would love to be able to grow this vine with huge blossoms on it, in my yard back in Saskatchewan.  Good luck Nadine.

I learned so much about Bromeliads and find them very cool now.

This tree trunk story was particularly interesting about why it forms spikes.  I would love to tell you the name of it but I can't remember what the guide said.  If you know then please tell me.

This tree bloom was incredible and the size of my hand.

This orchid wall to the left was right when you entered the gardens.

We ate lunch there outside on the patio under an umbrella trying to escape the sun and heat.  We shared the Ceviche and fries (which one of the ladies suggested were awesome).  Ceviche was incredible and the fries had really good flavour and were cooked fresh.  They were good too.

You can see the outdoor cafe to the right in this photo.  It is a lovely place to dine in amongst the water gardens of Naples Botanical Gardens.

The cost to enter is 25 USD but I found a coupon for 5 dollars off each adult.  Just pick up a coupon book at your hotel and search it out. (I am so Scottish but a proud frugal Scot!)  

There were many picture-worthy statues in the gardens.

We spent 3 hours at the Botanical Gardens and we would go back again.  It was heaven.

This tree was so pretty and provided so much shade.  When we looked up it had gigantic pods on it which I did not get a pic of.

There was a large water feature which provided a wonderful water-fall sound in the middle of the gardens.

This Botanical Garden was originally a 15 million dollar donation from one family.  This particular family still donates to the gardens and there is on-going construction enlarging the gardens at one end which you can see if you do the lake-walk.