Historic Farms Botanical Tour

The next day, we did a tour of the Botanical Gardens that are now on the grounds of the farm that supplied the Hospital with fruits, vegetables, meat, milk... for many years.

 One of the first things we saw was this gravestone.  The only thing buried on all this property is here, and it's a cow.  This cow was a world champion who died in 1932 and still holds records today!

They let Bob drive a golf cart for this tour.  He had fun doing it!

 There were lots of beautiful flowers...

The barns were beautiful too!

This barn burned at one time - the darker brick is the newer part.

 They took very good care of the animals.  They had cork bricks for the cows to stand on, the barns were heated, and each stall had fresh water plumbed in for them to drink.

In one of the barns was another tunnel.  There was a root cellar here, so they were able to get the vegetables through the tunnel.

This is the original horse barn.  It was unable to be restored, so they saved the foundation and made it into a walled garden.

 This is what it looks like now.

The flowers are planted as the barn was originally laid out, with flowers in the stable area.

It's hard to see, but there are 2 Japanese Lion sculptures on either side of the opening.  They were a gift from Japan to a U.S. General and he recently donated them to the gardens.

 When you walk through that opening, there is a Japanese Garden.

 Such a gorgeous place!

Here's  mystery to end the post.  These flowers were next to a sign explaining the history of the barns.  Our guide said that flowers appear every week.  They come in a variety of containers; pitchers, vases, canning jars.  However, no one ever sees them get delivered or picked up!