Shangri La and a boat ride
On Veteran’s Day, my veteran and I decided to take a trip to a nearby garden–Shangri La–in Orange Texas.
Mr. Stark owned a lot of land and was quite wealthy–establishing an art museum with a large collection of Western Art that is frequently shared with other art museums around the country—but he also enjoyed horticulture. Shangri La was set up as a display garden; people would spend their Sunday afternoons strolling through the walkways and enjoying the flowers and assorted displays. After his death, it fell into some disrepair but has since been renovated and is a wonderful place to spend an afternoon.
A bird blind is set up especially for photography and viewing of the birds although nesting season is long over. We did see two large alligators enjoying the sun on a ramp in the middle of the pond—and then there were turtles–lots of them—everywhere there was a branch sticking out of the water–there were no less than four turtles sunning themselves.
We signed up for the boat ride despite ominous clouds but were fortunate to only be chased by mosquitoes. Our boat captain was retired from Dupont and had a lot of interesting stories to tell=–as did our guide who detailed the loss of a microscope into the water during one of the school expeditions.
A great barred owl could be heard===Who cooks for youoooo== egrets were perched on the trees and an osprey flew over us returning home from a fishing trip.
A few scarecrows remained from the recent contest—and workers were busily putting up Christmas lights as well as weeding and pruning.
Pumpkins and gourds lined the walkways–and there were plenty of mosquitos encouraging us to keep moving.
More photos are on smugmug at https://sylviaweirphotos.smugmug.com/photos/swfpopup.mg?AlbumKey=hjH2TK
Sylvia Weir Art 
You do a great job of combining visual and verbal for a total work of art, Sylvia! I am enjoying your posts!