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| Frog sculpture |
The last weekend in May I decided I was finally going to take the trek to Bellevue; two buses, almost two hours, across Lake Washington. When I sat down to plan I realised that the reason it takes so long is because the buses only go once an hour and the second bus leaves 4 mins before the first bus arrives - public transport failing badly in this instance. What to do with 55 mins early Saturday morning? Have Breakfast at Portage Bay by the University. There food is organic, yummy, and a little on the pricey side but it was worth it. I'm smiling just thinking about my chorizo biscuits with gravy, and coffee. It came with two eggs and herby roasted potato cubes. The portion was good too despite the uber yummyness of it I couldn't eat it all. So started the morning on a very positive note, yum.
The second bus was on time but I missed my stop which meant I walked half a mile up the hill to Bellevue Botanical Gardens. I was slightly surprised to see I could walk up onto the site and it wasn't until I reached the top that I realised it was free - yipee!
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| Rock Garden |
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| Pinks in the rock garden |
First stop was their rock garden which was rocky but given the vast variety of alpine plants available was a little disappointing. I know the problem with alpines is they want to live on mountains but it was still a little sparse. The next item was a very large rain garden. Rain gardens are big news in Seattle. All the rainwater off the pavement and the houses gutter goes into storm drains and thence local streams before it drains directly into the lakes. The idea is that a rain garden take this water and delays its progress into the lakes allowing the water to be filtered on its journey thus reducing the pollution carried by the water and the floods and sewer overflows caused by storm water. The rain garden was being used to sell the idea to house owners and it looked nice too. Next I walked around a few more formal areas it was a bit hard to tell what area I was in but spring is definitely being the time to visit a garden!
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| White flower |
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| Border of one of the gardens |
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| Water feature and blossom |
I did a few circuits around the gardens water feature waiting for it to be empty so I could lie on my stomach and take some interesting perspective shots using a few blossoms from a nearby tree. I don't think I looked like too much of a fool?
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shade and sun light
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| backlit leaves |
After this I went into the wooded part of the gardens, the contrast between sunlit and shadow were amazing on this sunny day and the green leaves overhead were luminescent with the solar back lighting. I stopped by the stream that runs through the garden to do a little sketching. Then spent a while walking around and enjoying the dappled shade.
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| Stream running through the garden |
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| Rhododendrons |
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| More rhododendrons in Japanese gardens |
The next part of the garden to visit was the Japanese garden which as you might imagine was filled with Acers organised around a small pool that was mostly dry at the time of my visit. Following this I walked around some more of the woodland borders enjoying the rhododendrons.
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| Acer leaves |
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| Japanese garden, nothing screams Japan like ferns! |
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| Perennial Border |
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| Alliums |
Finally I came back around the the traditional perennial borders which were backed with colours but also a lot of different textures including some wheat and many alliums. The garden came about because it used to be a private garden belonging to a couple who donated the land, along with their house, to the city. The garden was then expanded through adding extra land. Their house is now the location of a small coffee shop, library and facilities. There is a small inner courtyard surround by glass a patio doors which boasts a small 4-5ft square garden. My final stop on the Bellevue Botanical Garden tour was the Ravine Experience. One crosses a suspension bridge to a small circular walk through the woodland.
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| More views of perennial borders |
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| small inner garden in house |
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| Entrance to Ravine Experiance |
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| In the 'ravine' |
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| Trees |
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| Trees |
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| Trees |
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| Trees |
Following this I made my way back down the hill through the woods on my way to the Mercer Slough Nature Reserve.
Through the woods...
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| Trees |
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| Trees |
...down the hill...
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| Cottonwood coated roses |
...over the road...
...past the fire station...
...under the free way...
.. across the road...
...onto the on road side walk...
... in to the nature reserve...
... past the steps...
...under the walkway...
...back to the steps...
...up the steps...
...to the visitors centre.
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| The nature reserve |
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| Wooden pier at tree top level |
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| The wooden pier had a little plaque with this inscription |
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| Across the Mercer Slough |
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| enjoying a warm days slither |
The nature reserve has two small circular walks on board walks and wood chip and a long trail around the reserve. When they say around, it literally goes around the outermost perimeter of the nature reserve so you can't see anything but road one side a trees the other.
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| Outer perimeter walk |
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| Looking into the nature reserve from the outside |
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| far southerly edge of nature reserve |
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| under the road |
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| Mercer Slough |
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| The bees were busy on the brambles |
They say the best way to see the nature reserve is to take a canoe up the central waterway, I think 'they' are correct in this instance. I enjoyed a nice shaded first circular walk then walked around the outside 'trail', then did a second lovely circular walk having overexposed myself to the sun for far too long. Next time, if there was a next time, I would just stick to the shorter walks where you actually get to see a bit of the nature reserve.
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| On the second board walk |
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Collapsed remnant of boiler house used to heat
green houses that are no longer in evidence |
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| Down town Bellevue in the distance |
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| Dragonfly sunbathing |
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| board-walk |
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| reeds and woods |
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| A little of my own art work |
A short bus trip later I was in Downtown Bellevue with one hour to look around the art museum. The art gallery cost about $12 dollars and I was done in 1 hour. The Gardens and Nature Reserve were free and I took about 6 hours to see them. I haven't put any photos of the gallery but instead I'll describe the exhibits. There were four collections spread over two floors. My favourite piece was by Romy Randev. A wooden box with an 8 by 8 checker of bulbs under a coloured in perspex pane. Not much to look at until your shadow accidentally brushed the surface then ... the little lights lit up. It was so sensitive that you could use on single finger to turn on a single light. The reason I loved this so much was that here was an example of a piece that the viewer can actually interact with. You may still wonder if a box of lights is really art but I enjoyed playing with it. Other cool things in this exhibit were a glass panel with a Persian rug print printed on it. Across the rug bare foot prints left empty impressions on the pattern. Also an installation entitled resonance about resonance. Take a piece of aluminium and scatter on glass powder, use a speaker attached to a frequency generator, cause vibrations, fuse sand shapes together in kiln. What you get is amazing different patterns for each tone. These were in black and hung from the ceiling in layers. They also had music playing composed of chimes of specific frequencies (a bit like a wind chime).
The other collection on this floor wasn't so much art as a collection of jewellery with an amazing story. Madeleine Albright was the first female Secretary of State (1997-2001) serving under President Clinton. She used jewellery pins to comment on the political situations she found herself in. My favourite was a Zebra, that would sit over the shoulder of a jacket, she wore it when visiting Nelson Mandela. She also had a set of monkey 'hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil' pins.
On the upper floor was an exhibition by Jana Brevick. She is all about the future. She had little robots made in aluminium, about 7 inches high, and tiny inch and a half wide staple escape ladder running from floor to ceiling with a tiny escape hatch on the floor. You could also board a space ship. With a catalogue printed on yellow fluorescent perspex you looked through little portholes along the white corridor and saw space debris. Then you walked around the mess room and looked at the strange scientific instruments on the wall.
The final exhibition was called new frontiers and had a mix of household objects, a dogs bed, a chair with with a thick cut through the legs and the seat suspended in the air, a set of ceramics with barnacles encrusted on them like seaside buoys. It also has a window looking out onto downtown Bellevue.
I finished the day with a meal at the cheesecake factory. Tempura veggies, sweet potato fries, and burger, with lovely warm bread and butter on the side... I may have eaten a little too much!
All that was left was to miss the bus because I went to the worng stop, have a walk around barnes and noble to pass so time and drinking a very sickly caramel machiato from Starbucks.
It was such a clear day that the shadows from the trees looked like they were projected up from the ground. 
