bok tower gardens

A while back—way, way back—R (my sister-in-law) had a prenup photo shoot and she asked one of our Sunshine friends to arrange it.

Friend A brought us all the way to Lake Wales, where the Bok Tower Gardens were. It was a pretty long drive—about 2 hours, including the pit stops for leaks—and by the time we were a few minutes a-ways, some of us were already on the wrong side of hypoglycemia.

We started out very early (in my opinion) and us 3 girls—Friend A, the bride-to-be, and hubby's assistant (me)—were cramped in the backseat of hubby’s Dakota. (Both boys—hubby the driver and the groom-to-be, where comfortably seated out front, argh!)

No legroom, leaky plumbing,  a grumbling stomach and I was all moody and quiet.

Good thing the destination more than made up for the grumpy ride.

the singing tower, as seen from the gardens

Bok Tower Gardens is one helluva botanical garden—tastefully landscaped and so picturesque, it was total eye candy for a sightseeing and photography junkie like me.

majestic oaks and love seats make for a poignant afternoon

a bench perfect for some romantic tryst

total eye candy, if you ask me

even the heron was a beautiful sight!

So I had fun click-click-clicking my way through the garden while running on the heels of a soon-to-be-hitched couple and their photographers.

(I took these pictures using Friend A's camera because mine—unfortunately—died on me in the first 5 minutes of getting to Bok Tower. The too-early morning wake up call scrambled my brains and I left behind my batteries...no pun intended.)

One of the things I love—something I thought was only for wimps when I was younger because it was so cheesy—is flowers. The more colorful and unusual they are, the better. (I’ll perorate later on the whys and wherefores of my flower love.)

I shot some really nice flowers on that hottish August day:

watchful yellow justicias

fiery red bromeliads in a row

stately and regal blue agapanthus blooms

(I'll let you in on a secret though: it took me hours—hours, I tell you!—to identify these flowers.)

Some stuff about Bok Tower Gardens:

• The gardens, spanning some 50 acres of land, were designed by famous landscape artist Frederick Law Olmsted Jr.
• It appears that the rolling greens of Bok Tower Gardens were originally “arid sandhills”, sporting only “virgin pines and sandhill scrub”
• Edward Bok—erstwhile editor of The Ladies’ Home Journal in the 1880s and Pulitzer Prize author—asked Olmsted to do the landscaping to preserve the “hilltop and create a bird sanctuary”
• There's a self-guided tour of the Pinewood Estate gardens and Mediterranean-style mansion (included in the National Registry of Historic Places), but for a fee
• The pride of Olmsted’s gardens is a 205-foot Singing Tower crafted in the art-deco and neo-Gothic style.
• The carillon tower has 60 bells and rings every half hour, though I can’t remember hearing it at the time. (I think there were some repairs being made.)

the singing tower, up close and personal

the whole shebang, all 205 feet of it

The only other carillon that I’ve loved is the one in UP Diliman, my alma mater:

the UP carillon tower and plaza. when i first attended the
state university this area wasn't as beautiful as it is now.
image by boink_99

One of these days, I'm definitely going to return to Bok Tower Gardens and when I do, I'm going to make sure I have my camera and lots of extra batteries (this time, pun intended)! I intend to explore and shoot to my heart's content.