Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, Coral Gables, FL

Wednesday, 12/7/11 - Ok, as of today the fabulous Golden Pass (available to all seniors) saved us another $36...total savings for 3 sightseeing outings so far = $86.00. How cool is that? The first Wednesday of each month a senior with a Golden Pass gets in the Fairchild Gardens for FREE including the guided 1 hour tram ride. Of course this was our day to visit the the 83 acre botanical gardens specializing in tropical plants from around the world. www.fairchildgarden.org

The place is absolutely amazing and they must have every kind of palm tree from around the world. It consists of beautiful lakes, path, lots of benches and walkways into different areas such as plants of Madagascar (which was one of my favorites) a beautiful rain forest, a butterfly garden (plants that attract butterflies that were everywhere), a Conservatory, a sunken garden, edible garden and so much more. Actually, words cannot describe the beauty of this place, do yourself a favor and look it up. We took our first tram ride through at 11 am, brought our picnic lunch inside the park (they welcomed us to do so) then walked for hours thru the rain forest, sunken garden, down around the lakes and through many of the the specialty areas, after the walk we boarded the tram AGAIN, and took another tour around.

Also there was my favorite glass guy...Dale Chihuly in the Conservatory he had a gorgeous multi colored glass art piece at least 12 - 15 ft tall mounted in water so that you could see the refection of it as you looked at it. Outside, he had a series of at least 10 - Cobalt Herons in a pool. December, has been a HUGE art month in Miami and at the Fairchild there was an exhibit of by Will Ryman, a 42 year old guy from New York that built these unbelievable rose "structures" made out of fiberglass and steel and they were placed throughout the park. The biggest one was 5 red roses (pedals & stems only) that measured 30ft tall and 12ft wide. There were other smaller ones of pink, blue, purple and yellow through out the park. Also around the roses would be "petal shaped chairs" of the same color - it was breathtaking......I can't imagine how many pictures I took of just those roses. He also had bumble bee, about 15 ants displayed outside in the park. I am really looking forward to going through these pictures this evening.

We finally left there about 3:30 pm and were thoroughly exhausted when we got home, it was a beautiful Miami winter day....83 degrees and hardly any wind. I swear, when you hear them play a Christmas Carol on the radio it seems so strange.......REALLY, this can't be Christmas time here!!! Much love to all our family and friends and the fun just keeps on coming.